Preamble

The House met at half-past Two o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

ALLHALLOWS STAINING CHURCHYARD BILL [Lords]

RIO TINTO RHODESIAN MINING LIMITED BILL [Lords]

Read the Third time and passed, without Amendment.

BERKSHIRE AND BUCKINGHAMSHIRE COUNTY COUNCILS (WINDSOR-ETON BRIDGE &C.) BILL [Lords]

LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL (MONEY) BILL

Read a Second time and committed.

TRUNK PIPELINES BILL (By Order)

Second Reading deferred till Thursday at Seven o'clock.

Oral Answers to Questions — AGRICULTURE, FISHERIES AND FOOD

Apples and Pears (Marketing)

Mr. Hornby: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether a scheme has yet been submitted to him by apple and pear producers in the United Kingdom to permit the more orderly and successful marketing of their crops, including the setting of a minimum standard below which no apples or pears would be offered in the primary markets, and to make provision for the raising of funds for publicity; and whether he will make a statement.

The Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. Christopher Soames): No, Sir. I have not yet received any such proposals. I know that many growers are interested in this possibility, and if they decided to submit a scheme, I can assure my hon. Friend that it will be sympathetically considered by the Government in accordance with the procedure laid down in the Agricultural Marketing Act.

Mr. Hornby: Is my right hon. Friend aware—as I think he has indicated—that there is great interest in improved methods of marketing in the industry and that possibly one of the reasons why he has not yet received schemes is that there is doubt about what would or


might constitute the minimum essentials in the Agricultural Marketing Act? If my right hon. Friend could indicate his views, this would greatly help the industry to try to reach some sort of agreement on the schemes which might be put forward.

Mr. Soames: I do not accept that it is lack of knowledge or of thinking on the part of the Government which is holding matters up, but I would certainly be glad to enter into any conversations that might help. As my hon. Friend will appreciate, it would be wrong for me to say anything in anticipation of the well-known procedure under the Agricultural Marketing Act.

Kitchen Waste

Mrs. Butler: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how many local authorities now collect and process kitchen waste for animal feeding; and what advice his Department gives with regard to such schemes.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. W. M. F. Vane): I understand that twelve local authorities collect and process kitchen waste for animal feeding. The Department is always glad to give technical information and advice to any local authority seeking it but the final arrangements are the responsibility of the local authority concerned.

Mrs. Butler: In view of the importance to the national economy of making the best use of all our resources and also the public health advantages of this method of disposing of waste, will the Minister study the experience of boroughs which are carrying out these processes, particularly the Borough of Tottenham, which is still producing "Tottenham Pudding" effectively and usefully, to see what the difficulties and the advantages are and to give positive advice to local authorities to encourage them to follow Tottenham's example?

Mr. Vane: I certainly agree that a number of local authorities are doing valuable work. At the same time, however, I should like to take this opportunity of warning everybody of the need to keep unboiled food waste away from farm animals because of the disease risk.

Milk Bread

Mr. de Freitas: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether he will make regulations so that the seller of milk bread which does not contain milk must disclose this fact.

Mr. Soames: I am at present considering the whole question of the use of the description milk bread. I have already circulated draft regulations and received a number of representations on them. I shall want to consider these carefully before arriving at a final decision.

Mr. de Freitas: In considering this matter, will the Minister recognise that on this occasion the producers and the consumers have come out early enough in pressing upon the Minister the importance of the maintenance of standards and that, if something is described as milk, it should be milk as we understand it in ordinary parlance?

Mr. Soames: A number of representations have been made to me and the point that the hon. Member has made is one of them. I will consider them all before making a final announcement.

Horticultural Marketing (Dutch Auction System)

Mr. de Freitas: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food when he expects to receive from the Horticultural Marketing Council its views on the possibility of establishing an auction system based on that prevailing in the Netherlands.

Mr. Soames: The Horticultural Marketing Council will, I understand, be considering the whole question this week. I shall be interested to know their views in due course. But, as I told the hon. Member in reply to his Question last week, more information is needed before any conclusions can be reached on whether the Dutch auction system could be generally applied with advantage in this country.

Mr. de Freitas: Is it not time that the Ministry gave direct advice to the Council? Does not the Ministry now have very good evidence that this system helps both the consumers and the producers?

Mr. Soames: It helps in certain Continental countries. I know that the hon. Gentleman will have read the most interesting Departmental Report. I am not convinced, however, that what is right in one country would necessarily suit this country. There are many differences. Our grading is nowhere near as advanced as in Holland, for example. In addition, the growers in this country are not concentrated in small areas to the same extent as in Holland. There are many different factors, but, as stated in the Report, it is well worth considering whether a pilot scheme should be carried out.

Charollais Cattle

Mr. Clive Bossom: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what representations have been made to him by the Australian Government concerning the proposed import of Charollais cattle from France into the United Kingdom.

Mr. Soames: None, Sir.

Eggs (Prices)

Mr. Walker: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food how much of the fall in egg prices he attributes to the import of eggs from Poland and Roumania.

Mr. Soames: As my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade said on 20th April producers' organisations have applied for anti-dumping duty on these imports. This application is now being examined and the effect on prices is, of course, an important part of the case. I have been having urgent consultations with my right hon. Friend who is also in touch with the Polish and Roumanian authorities.

Mr. Walker: My right hon. Friend will, I think, recognise that producers are deeply concerned at the delay in applying anti-dumping legislation concerning these imports. Will he undertake to consult his right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade to see whether, in future, these powers can be applied far more speedily?

Mr. Soames: As matters stand, a good deal has to be proved before antidumping legislation can be invoked. I do not accept that my right hon. Friend

the President of the Board of Trade has acted with other than speed on this occasion. As I have said, however, I am in the closest touch with my right hon. Friend and I hope that it will not be long before a conclusion can be reached.

Mr. Turton: Is my right hon. Friend aware that, whilst these discussions are going on, Roumanian eggs are pouring in at very low prices and breaking the market? Can he devise a quicker method of dealing with a problem such as this?

Mr. Soames: The only method available to us under existing legislation is anti-dumping measures.

Mr. Turton: Will my right hon. Friend consider revising that anti-dumping legislation to permit of quicker methods?

Mr. Soames: No. I am not yet convinced that the anti-dumping legislation is not effective.

Common Land

Mr. Boyden: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether he has now concluded his consultations with local authorities about the future of common land; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Soames: I have received and am considering the comments of the local authority and other interests which were consulted, but I am not yet in a position to make a statement.

Mr. Boyden: Has there not been considerable delay in this matter? Cannot the Government say when they propose to introduce legislation on the subject?

Mr. Soames: I wish that I could, but this matter involves complex questions of law, history and land use. I am anxious to proceed as quickly as possible, but I want to try to get the right answer. This is a complex matter. It is not that I am trying to hold back, but it takes a good deal of time to try to solve these problems.

Sir G. Nicholson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that in most cases, land that is called common land is not land held in common but land in which the rights belong to certain commoners? Will my right hon. Friend ensure that


no firm action is taken by the Government without consulting representative commoners in each case?

Mr. Soames: Interested parties have been consulted all along the line, but it becomes difficult to consult commoners before there is registration by which we can know who are the commoners with the interests involved.

Mr. Ede: In view of the Answers given this afternoon by the right hon. Gentleman and his Parliamentary Secretary, can the Minister tell us the last date on which he reached any decision?

Mr. Lipton: Ten sixty-six.

Milk

Mr. Morris: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food at what stage in the discussions of the National Farmers' Union and the Milk Marketing Board on the new two-tier price of milk system his Department will take part; what proposals he will put forward; and whether individuals or other bodies will be able to put forward proposals.

Mr. Soames: The Farmers' Unions and the Milk Marketing Boards in the United Kingdom are setting up a committee to examine this question and have invited the Agricultural Departments to appoint representatives. I have no specific proposals to put forward. The last part of the Question is a matter for the committee. The Departmental representatives will be prepared to contribute fully to the examination and discussion of this question.

Mr. Morris: Is the Minister aware, even though he has not come to a decision on the subject, that while some forms of differential prices would be welcomed by small producers, individual quotas would be a body-blow to their marginal existence? Will the Minister ensure that the views of small producers producing, say, 50 or 60 gallons a day are obtained from suitable organisations, such as the district committees of the agricultural executive committees, before a decision is reached?

Mr. Soames: I am aware that many different views and opinions are held on this subject and that the hon. Member himself holds some. It is excellent that

this important subject should be dis-discussed in public and given the consideration which it is at last getting. I am hopeful that the Committee will come forward with proposals which will be beneficial to the dairy industry.

Mr. de Freitas: Since, in this matter, the Minister has passed the buck to the National Farmers' Union and the Milk Marketing Board, will not he take account of the suggestion by my hon. Friend that other organisations and bodies over which the right hon. Gentleman has control should be able to give evidence about the small producers?

Mr. Soames: Yes, Sir. There should be no difficulty about evidence being given before the Committee. I have no doubt that the Committee will be anxious to collect opinions from many and various organisations. I certainly would be glad to have them.

Mr. Morris: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the Minister's reply, I give notice that I shall raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Fuel Oil

Mr. Morris: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food the estimated extra cost to the agricultural industry arising from the Budget proposals regarding fuel oil; and what plans he has for the recoupment of these extra costs by the industry.

Mr. Vane: The extra cost is estimated to be about £2 million in a full year. The extra cost will be taken into account in the ordinary way at the 1962 Annual Review.

Mr. Morris: Is the Parliamentary Secretary aware that the income of the farming community, both farmers and workers, is far from keeping pace with that of the remainder of the community, as pointed out only last week by the President of the National Farmers' Union? Has it finally been decided by the Government—if they have made one decision at least—that the industry should be sacrificed?

Mr. Vane: The Price Review, which took place only a short time ago, was agreed with the industry. Of course, a Price Review cannot prejudice a general change in the taxation position, which


occurs from time to time in the Budget and not necessarily one way only. It can change either way. In this case, the agricultural industry will not be bearing more than its fair share of the duty and it will be doing this with all other users.

Mr. Hilton: Is the Parliamentary Secretary aware that his reply will be unwelcome in counties such as Norfolk? It is all very well to say that the matter will be taken into consideration at the next Price Review, but that is ten months away. Is the hon. Gentleman aware that this proposal has caused great concern in Norfolk and that farmers and horticulturists are critical of this action? Will not the hon. Gentleman ask his right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor of the Exchquer to have another look at this proposal, which will be very hard in its effect upon agriculture and horticulture?

Mr. Vane: Any upward change in taxation or excise duty is unwelcome, but we must not exaggerate the effect of this tax upon any industry. The hon. Member will remember that there is a well-recognised procedure for holding a special review when cost changes of a substantial nature occur during the year, and we will bear that in mind. The present changes to which the hon. Member has referred certainly do not amount to the sort of change which comes within the purview of the special review procedure.

Mr. P. Browne: Is it not true that my right hon. Friend has been encouraging horticulturists throughout the country by way of grants to heat their greenhouses by oil? Does not he think that this tax goes against the encouragement which he has been giving in the past two years?

Mr. Vane: Once again, it is a mistake to exaggerate this small change. Admittedly, horticulturists do not stand to get the benefit from changes in a Price Review. The National Farmers' Union has approached my right hon. Friend about this, and I believe that he is arranging to meet the union shortly.

Sheep Dipping Regulations

Sir A. Hurd: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he has agreed to the request of the National

Sheep Breeders' Association that he should call a conference of county council representatives to consider present anomalies in the sheep dipping regulations which now vary between one county and another.

Mr. Soames: My Department will be glad to discuss this question with the interests concerned.

Sir A. Hurd: I congratulate my right hon. Friend on that decision. Will this meeting with the county council representatives be held before the end of May so that any changes in dipping regulations can be made effective for this season?

Mr. Soames: I will certainly do my best to see that that happens.

Bread and Flour (Food Standard Committee's Report)

Mr. Lipton: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he has considered the representations he has received on the Food Standard Committee's Report on Bread and Flour; and what action he will now take.

Mr. Soames: I know the hon. Member's interest in this important question, but I must remind him that there are a large number of recommendations in the Report and the representations I have received raise many complicated issues. I shall make a statement as soon as I have had time to consider them.

Mr. Lipton: While not being surprised at the Minister's typically indecisive reply, may I ask him when the Government will do something about ensuring that decent bread, instead of the present unsatisfactory product, is available for the long-suffering public? Has he not had more than two months in which to consider the representations that he has received and, after many years, is it not time that something happened?

Mr. Soames: I have nothing to add to what I have said to the hon. Gentleman on the numerous occasions that he has tabled Questions on this matter in the recent past.

Mr. Shinwell: Does the right hon. Gentleman understand that some of us


appreciate his caution, because it is obvious that as long as he is cautious he will not make any mistakes?

Mr. Soames: The right hon. Gentleman should know.

River Blackwater (Radioactive Waste)

Mr. Driberg: asked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food if he will make a statement on the proposed discharge of liquid and gaseous radioactive waste into the River Blackwater from the Bradwell nuclear power station; and what expert advice he has received on the effect of this discharge on the oysters and other marine life in the estuary.

Mr. Vane: The proposed discharges of liquid and gaseous radioactive waste have been described in detail in a circular letter of 16th January to the local authorities concerned.
I am satisfied, on the advice of our scientists, that the oysters and other marine life in the estuary will suffer no harm and will not in any way be rendered unfit for human consumption.

Mr. Driberg: Is the Parliamentary Secretary aware that that Answer is quite contradictory to the evidence given by expert marine biologists at the public inquiry, even though at that time the C.E.A. pretended that there would not be any radioactivity in the effluent but that it would only be hot chlorinated water from the cooling system? Why should the Authority get away with such a gross breach of faith to the public? Will the hon. Gentleman look at this matter again?

Mr. Vane: I do not think that it is a gross breach of faith at all, but I will certainly consider any evidence that the hon. Gentleman sends me. I am advised by our scientists that no harm is likely to come to the oysters, which is what the hon. Gentleman asked me.

Mr. Driberg: Has the hon. Gentleman seen the comments made at last week's meeting of the Kent and Essex Sea Fisheries Committee, which knows a good deal more about oysters than he does and thinks that they will be harmed?

Mr. Vane: I am prepared to believe that a lot of people know more about oysters than I do. I, for one, do not like them, but I am here to protect them and I am advised that they are not likely to come to any harm as a result of what is proposed here.

Mr. Driberg: "I weep for you…".

Oral Answers to Questions — GOVERNMENT INFORMATION SERVICES

Teaching of English (Filmed Television Programmes)

Mr. Mayhew: asked the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster how many filmed programmes are now available for the teaching of English by television overseas.

The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster (Dr. Charles Hill): Five.

Mr. Mayhew: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is an enormous future market in programmes of this kind? Does he realise that it is not only that the programmes are in the English language but that the content and presentation are British which gives us a great opportunity? Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that we have made a very slow start, and will he give more priority to this matter?

Dr. Hill: I concur in the first part of the hon. Gentleman's remarks. We are, however, in an experimental phase. A number of films have been made—five for the British Council and a number for the B.B.C. We are not yet satisfied that the proper technique has been evolved for the teaching of English as a foreign language, but once this experimental phase is over and the lines are laid down, I agree with the hon. Gentleman that we may go ahead.

Mr. Mayhew: While agreeing with the right hon. Gentleman that, having seen some of these programmes, they are bad, may I ask him whether he is aware that this has been going on for many months and that the Americans are making great strides in this field?

Dr. Hill: The American films are for home consumption for immigrant populations. We are aware of them. It is important, however, to get this investigation phase properly done before we launch out into something larger.

Overseas Information Services (Cost)

Mr. Mayhew: asked the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster what is the proposed cost of the overseas information services in 1961–62; and how much is attributable to the British Council, the British Broadcasting Corporation's external services, and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Colonial Information Services, respectively.

Dr. Hill: £20·2 million. £6·4 million of this will be for the British Council, £7·0 million for the B.B.C.'s external services and monitoring, and £3·6 million, £2·4 million and £07 million for the Foreign, Commonwealth and Colonial Offices' Overseas information work respectively. A statement explaining this appreciable increase in estimated expenditure, together with detailed figures, is given as Table VI in the Financial Secretary's Memorandum on the Estimates.

Mr. Mayhew: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the increase in the scale of these activities will be welcome but that, compared with the need and opportunity, we are still not doing nearly enough in this field? Will he consider particularly the fact that the amount of B.B.C. broadcasting is still being constantly overtaken by other countries? Will the right hon. Gentleman consider issuing a White Paper to set out the overall policy and direction behind the information services, which is not very clear at the moment?

Dr. Hill: First, it is true that, of the increase of about £2 million, about £1 million goes to the British Council, about £700,000 to the Commonwealth Relations Office and about £300,000 to the B.B.C. In answer to the hon. Gentleman's second point, I am sure that he agrees that it is not only quantity but quality as well which matters and that the B.B.C.'s reputation for objectivity is of immense value. Thirdly, I will consider the point that the hon. Gentleman has made.

Sir G. Nicholson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there is the danger of a certain hiatus when a Colony attains independence? Will he pay particular attention to that point?

Dr. Hill: Particular attention is being paid to it, and it lies behind some of the changes in these Estimates.

Oral Answers to Questions — PENSIONS AND NATIONAL INSURANCE

Blind Persons (National Assistance)

Mr. Frank Allaun: asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance what representations he has received regarding National Assistance Board scales for blind persons.

The Minister of Pensions and National Insurance (Mr. John Boyd-Carpenter): I have received a few letters, almost all in general and similar terms, suggesting that whenever assistance rates go up the differential between the special scale for blind persons and the ordinary scale should also be increased. I would refer the hon. Member to what I said on this subject during the debate on the National Assistance Regulations on 1st December.

Mr. Allaun: Will the right hon. Gentleman reconsider the two most reasonable requests made by the National League of the Blind? Is he aware of the very deep dissatisfaction among the 55,000 blind people receiving National Assistance that they, whose needs are greatest, have been receiving only 3s. 6d. a week since 3rd April compared with 7s. 6d. a week for retirement pensioners and that their special allowance has not been raised at all?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: With regard to the hon. Gentleman's comparison with retirement pensioners, he will be well aware that those receiving this rate of National Assistance, and, indeed, all those receiving the general rates, have benefited from the 1959 increase which did not apply to National Insurance benefits. Therefore, it is not a fair comparison.
In answer to the hon. Gentleman's general point, it is a fact that the differential is sometimes increased when the scale rates move, but not always. It was in fact increased in 1952, 1955, 1956 and 1959, but not in 1950, 1951, or 1958. It is very much a matter of judgment whether the differential should be increased. The important point, of course, is that these unhappy people do share fully in the increase in the National Assistance scale rates.

Former Prisoners of War, Japan

Sir J. Smyth: asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance whether he is now in a position to make a statement about the disposal of the United Kingdom share of the balance of the assets under Article 16 of the Peace Treaty with Japan and of any further sum which has become available under Article 14.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Yes, Sir. We have received a further £196,000 under Article 16, including £24,000 due to members of the Colonial Forces, and a further £22,000 under Article 14.
I paid over £182,000 at the end of last month to the Far Eastern (Prisoners of War and Internees) Fund. This brings the total paid to this Fund up to £326,000.
Among the objects provided under the Fund's Trust deed, as I said in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish) on 26th January, 1959, is the provision of accommodation, etc., for aged and sick former Far Eastern prisoners of war. I understand that in the light of the provision of this further sum, the trustees are discussing with the British Legion arrangements for such accommodation in British Legion homes.

Sir J. Smyth: Does my right hon. Friend realise that the statement he has just made brings this matter, which first came before the House ten years ago, to a very satisfactory conclusion, on which I know that the Far Eastern prisoners of war would like to express their gratitude to the Minister and to the officials of the old Ministry of Pensions and of the present Ministry for all the hard work they have done? May I ask my right hon. Friend if he will let me know, in round figures, the total amount that has been received for the benefit of the Far Eastern prisoners of war from the Japanese assets under the articles of the Treaty, and from the Burma-Siam Railway?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I can do better than that, and give my hon. Friend the precise figure, which is £4,816,473 15s. 9d.

National Health Service Charges

Mr. Biggs-Davison: asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance whether he will consider

issuing a simple leaflet on, and giving more publicity to, the system of refunds of charges under the National Health Service.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Yes, Sir. The special leaflet, of which I told the House on 27th February, has been widely available since the beginning of this month. On the other steps being taken to secure proper publicity about this, I will write to my hon. Friend.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: Can my right hon. Friend say exactly where this special leaflet is obtainable?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Certainly; it is available at all the offices of the National Assistance Board, and also at Citizens' Advice Bureaux, Old People's Welfare Committees and other local bodies, as well as in doctors' surgeries and in chemists' shops.

Mr. Houghton: Will the Minister watch this matter very carefully? Is he aware that on neither side of the House is there any real satisfaction that a solution has been found to this matter, and that there are widespread misgivings whether people who may be entitled to refunds will in fact get them? I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will fulfil the wishes of the House if he will watch the matter carefully.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I fully share the hon. Gentleman's desire on this matter and so does my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health, who is, of course, responsible for the complementary steps being taken by way of information in doctors' surgeries, on the prescription form, and so on.

Mr. Fernyhongh: Does not the right hon. Gentleman realise that no matter how much publicity he may give to the idea of reclaiming charges that are imposed, the charges will nevertheless remain mean, despicable and indefensible?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I think the hon. Gentleman has got it rather wrong.

Mr. P. Browne: Is my right hon. Friend aware that to my knowledge three days ago, a doctor with a large practice in my constituency said that he was not aware of the increased scope of these benefits under National Health scales, and will he consult his right hon. Friend


the Minister of Health to ensure that all doctors have this leaflet and are asked to display it in their surgeries?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: I am not at all clear what increased benefits my hon. Friend is talking about. So far as this particular doctor is concerned, if either my hon. Friend or the doctor himself would get in touch with the local office of the National Assistance Board, a supply of this leaflet can certainly be made available to him. So far as the other matter is concerned, that is a matter for my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health.

Ship-Repairing Dispute, Merseyside (Unemployment Benefit)

Sir H. Oakshott: asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance why the claims to unemployment benefit of certain workers, of whom details have been sent to him and who are out of employment because of the ship-repairing dispute on Merseyside, have been disallowed.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Because the local tribunal has ruled that payment of unemployment benefit to the men concerned would be contrary to the provisions of Section 13 of the National Insurance Act, 1946. I am writing to my hon. Friend about this case.

Sir H. Oakshott: Does not my right hon. Friend think that it is a rather extraordinary situation that men who are in no way parties to the dispute but who, because of it, and through no fault of their own, are out of work should be denied unemployment benefit? Will he look into the matter again to see if something cannot be done to help these people?

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: It is not for me to comment on the decision of independent statutory authorities from whom, of course, as my hon. Friend is aware, an appeal lies, if it is desired to take it, to the National Insurance Commissioners. I would add, however, that it appears that the local tribunal took the view that in this case, which involves a demarcation dispute, my hon. Friend's constituents were directly interested in the result of that demarcation dispute. It is not for me to comment, but that is the reason, I understand, which weighed with the tribunal.

Disability Pension (Mr. Ferdinand)

Mr. Delargy: asked the Minister of Pensions and National Insurance why Mr. A. J. Ferdinand, 19, Templer Avenue, Chadwell-St.-Mary, Essex, is not receiving a 100 per cent. disability pension.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Pensions and National Insurance (Mr. Richard Sharples): Because the complaint from which this gentleman suffers was not caused by his war service but aggravated thereby, the assessment of his disablement for war pensions purposes is based on the extent of such aggravation. As the hon. Member is aware, it is open to Mr. Ferdinand to appeal against his assessment to the Pensions Appeal Tribunal.

Mr. Delargy: Is it not a fact that this man is totally disabled as a result of sickness contracted on Army service? Is it not a fact that when he was assessed at 40 per cent. disability, he was only 40 per cent. disabled, but, as everybody knew, his sickness was of a progressive nature, and bound to get worse? Now he is totally disabled as a result of the sickness contracted during his Army service. Why should he not receive a 100 per cent. disability pension without having to appeal to anybody?

Mr. Sharples: As I told the hon. Gentleman in our correspondence, until 27th May this man has a right of appeal against his current assessment to an independent pensions appeal tribunal. It is very much better that this question should be thrashed out before an independent appeal tribunal rather than on the Floor of the House.

Oral Answers to Questions — COAL

Chemical Industry (Hydrogen Production)

Mr. Ginsburg: asked the Minister of Power, in view of his responsibility for promoting economy and efficiency in the consumption of fuel and power, what consideration he has given to the effect of the recent decision in the chemical industry to undertake hydrogen production from light oils instead of from coke as is done at present.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Power (Mr. John George): The objectives referred to by the Son. Member are best achieved by leaving consumers free to Choose the materials best suited to their particular needs.

Mr. Ginsburg: Is the Minister aware that a recent decision by Imperial Chemical Industries is likely to cost the National Coal Board a market for 600,000 tons of coal? Has the Minister had any consultation with either of these two parties, and is he, in particular, satisfied that the National Coal Board went to the limit in trying to retain this important market?

Mr. George: The hon. Member must not confuse the use of coal as a source of power with the use of coal as an industrial raw material. The change in this case affects coal as an industrial raw material, and my right hon. Friend would not wish to dictate to a private company what its industrial raw materials should be.

Research and Development

Mr. Ginsburg: asked the Minister of Power what proportion of the National Coal Board's total outlay is devoted to research and development; and what general direction he has given to the Board to increase such outlay.

Mr. George: In 1961, about 0·6 per cent. of the Board's recent total expenditure. I do not consider a general direction would be appropriate.

Mr. Ginsburg: Is the Minister aware that this figure is ludicrously low and far lower than that obtaining in manufacturing industry? Will he have a look at the comparable figures for the chemical industry, where the proportion spent on scientific research represents 4·8 per cent. of the net output of the industry? What talks is he having with the Minister for Science on this important matter?

Mr. George: The proportion is lower than that for manufacturing industry generally, and that I readily admit, but a comparison of the expenditure on research between extractive and manufacturing industries is extremely difficult. The National Coal Board has increased is total expenditure on research from

£3·3 million in 1959 to £5 million in 1961, and it is very ready to increase it further if new possibilities of promise can be identified. My right hon. Friend is in consultation constantly with the Minister for Science on the question of research.

Oral Answers to Questions — GAS

Liquid Methane

Mr. A. Roberts: asked the Minister of Power what is the amount of liquid methane imported into the United Kingdom since the 1st January, 1961; and what has been the cost to his Department.

Mr. George: The answers are "None" and "Nothing". The cost of the earlier experimental imports was borne by the Gas Council.

Mr. Roberts: May I take it from that reply that the complete cessation of imports of liquid gas will continue, or am I to understand that we are really awaiting a report by the Minister on the imports that have already taken place?

Mr. George: The hon. Member must not assume that imports of liquid methane will not at some time be resumed, but at the moment the position is as he has stated, and my right hon. Friend is awaiting final proposals from the Gas Council.

Mr. Roberts: Will it be possible to have the report on the implications of this within the next few months?

Mr. George: There is no report in existence in regard to these proceedings, but my right hon. Friend promised to come to the House after he had had final proposals from the Gas Council, which he still awaits.

Normanton

Mr. A. Roberts: asked the Minister of Power what capital developments in the gas industry he has authorised to be undertaken in the Normanton constituency.

Mr. George: The North Eastern Gas Board's investment this year in the hon. Member's constituency will be chiefly in mains, services, and meters.

Mr. Roberts: Will it be at all possible, and will the Minister look into the possibility of installing a Lurgi gas plant, and so far as capital expenditure is concerned, may I ask him if he will have some investigation into the redevelopment of Rothwell, so that there could be proper showrooms and offices?

Mr. George: In answer to the first part of the hon. Member's supplementary question, as he is well aware, two Lurgi plants are now being built, and some experience of the operation of these plants must be obtained over a fairly long period before consideration of extending their use can be entertained. With regard to the second part of his supplementary question, I am aware that some development is contemplated in Rothwell, and I assume that the hon. Gentleman is referring to the provision of new showrooms. The Consultative Council has drawn the attention of the Board to this new development, and it is prepared to reconsider the matter in the light of this new development.

Oral Answers to Questions — ELECTRICITY

Nuclear Power Station, Bradwell

Mr. Driberg: asked the Minister of Power how soon he expects that the Bradwell nuclear power station will be in operation; what is the present expectation of effective life of this power station; and what the total cost of construction, including widening of roads, purchase of land, compensation, erection of pylons, and all other relevant expenditure, is now likely to be; what percentage of the nation's requirement of electric power will be met from this source; and, approximately, what effect this additional supply will have on the price of electricity to the consumer.

Mr. George: The Bradwell station is expected to be in full operation by the middle of 1962. Its life cannot at present be accurately predicted as there is little experience of operating nuclear power stations; for accountancy purposes a life of twenty years has been assumed. The cost of the items named, plus the nuclear fuel charge, is likely to be about £58 million. The capacity at Bradwell will represent about 1 per cent. of the generating capacity in England and

Wales. This station alone will not have any significant effect on electricity tariffs.

Mr. Driberg: Do not those figures tend to show that this estuary has been spoilt and is to be polluted for the sake of material benefits which may prove largely illusory? Does the hon. Gentleman realise that the present Minister's predecessor took the decision to allow this project after a public inquiry from which the C.E.A. concealed a number of relevant facts, including one mentioned in an earlier Question today?

Mr. George: I cannot entertain the suggestion of the hon. Member that the C.E.G.B. would at any time conceal relevant facts.

Mr. Driberg: It was the C.E.A. then.

Mr. George: As to the derival of material benefits from this installation, I am sure this country will derive material benefits. The situation is that the demand for electricity is rising so fast that in fifteen to twenty years it will not be possible to meet it from conventional fuels. Increasing supplies of nuclear power will be needed to achieve technological progress in industry, and to ensure that this country is kept in the van of progress we must continue to erect nuclear projects at the rate of one per annum.

Costs

Mr. Warbey: asked the Minister of Power what interest rates are assumed in his calculation that electric power will be generated as cheaply in nuclear power stations as in stations fired by fossil fuels by the year 1967; and by what year he estimates parity would be reached if interest rates were lowered by 1, 2 and 3 per cent., respectively.

Mr. George: Nuclear power for base load generation is not expected to become competitive with conventional generation until about 1970. The interest rate assumed by the Generating Board in calculating the future costs of electricity is 5½ per cent. Other things being equal, a reduction of 3 per cent. in the rate of interest might advance the date of parity by about two years.

Mr. Warbey: Can the Parliamentary Secretary say why he disagrees with the estimate of Sir John Cockcroft that parity


should be achieved on the present basis and present interest rates by 1967? Secondly, do not the figures he has given in the last part of his Answer show that the archaic methods of calculating amortisation of capital on high interest rates are delaying the coming of cheap energy to this country?

Mr. George: I would not personally dream of dissenting from what Sir John Cockcroft said, but we are working on the best advice available to the Government in estimating for 1970. As to the second part of the hon. Member's supplementary question, on high interest rates, his proposal would infer the granting of a subsidy by the Government to this industry, which has the highest natural increase in demand of any in the country, and that proposal is wholly unacceptable

Oral Answers to Questions — MINISTRY OF AVIATION

Helicopters

Mr. Dodds: asked the Minister of Aviation if he will make a statement on the progress made in the development of city centre to city centre helicopter passenger services in the United Kingdom; and what are the prospects for London in this connection.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Aviation (Mr. Geoffrey Rippon): I would refer the hon. Member to the reply which I gave to the hon. Member for Bosworth (Mr. Wyatt) on 20th February.

Mr. Dodds: In view of the optimistic Report of the Inter-Departmental Helicopter Committee in 1951 and the progress made with helicopters in other countries, is it not most unsatisfactory that practically nothing has been done here in the past ten years? In view of the fact that we cannot enter the space race or send a man to the moon, would it not be some consolation if we could have at least an inter-city service between Manchester and London? Can we not see some enterprise from the Government in this vitally important matter?

Mr. Rippon: I think we must accept that it will be some time before we can have an economic inter-city helicopter service. I am aware of the services there

are abroad, but almost all of them are very heavily subsidised.

Mr. Chetwynd: Can the hon. Gentleman say what is holding up this development and when a decision will be taken on the use of the Fairey Rotodyne and what assistance is being given B.E.A. to operate this service?

Mr. Rippon: Nothing is holding up progress. On the Rotodyne I have nothing to add to the reply which my right hon. Friend gave to the hon. Member on 6th March.

Mr. Chetwynd: If nothing is holding up progress, how can the hon. Gentleman explain why nothing has happened?

Mr. Rippon: Quite a deal is happening.

Mr. Dodds: Where? In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I beg to give notice that I shall raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Vertical Take-off Aircraft

Mr. Rankin: asked the Minister of Aviation whether he proposes to order for military purposes any aircraft capable of vertical take-off and landing; and if he will make a statement.

The Minister of Aviation (Mr. Peter Thorneycroft): I have nothing to add to the replies which I gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Sir A. V. Harvey) on 14th November last and to my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, East (Mr. McMaster) on 20th February.

Mr. Rankin: Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that vertical take-off and landing is now a development which is entirely practicable? Does he realise that it can be applied to civilian aircraft up to a certain capacity? Will not he agree that this development would be encouraged if he were to place a military order or two? Will he agree, also, that it would have a tremendous effect in reducing the congestion with which we are faced at present at London Airport and other airports in the country?

Mr. Thorneycroft: That vertical take-off is practicable, there can be no doubt. I think it is a tribute to the British firms concerned which have shown the way. We have developed two


experimental types, and we are negotiating in the case of one of them, the Hawker P 1127, the possibility of developing it jointly with the Germans.

Mr. McMaster: Will my right hon. Friend take steps to make available more planes such as the SC 1, as there can hardly be a military requirement until sufficient vertical take-off and landing aircraft are available for a full and fair evaluation to be made by the Army of this important and easily dispersible type of support fighter or reconnaissance plane?

Mr. Thorneycroft: Two experimental planes of the SC 1 type have been developed, but one thing which would cause a setback to vertical take-off would be for the Ministry of Aviation or anyone else to start developing and actually producing large numbers of planes for which in fact there is no demand.

Mr. Chetwynd: Is not this a field in which this country has taken the lead in inventiveness and skill? Does the Minister mean that there is no military requirement for this revolutionary plane?

Mr. Thorneycroft: No, I do not say that. I said we were developing the Hawker P 1127 and seeking to do that in co-operation with our allies in Europe.

Turnhouse Airport

Mr. Gourlay: asked the Minister of Aviation what is the nature and extent of the alterations being carried out at Turnhouse Airport; and when the airport will again be operational.

Mr. Rippon: The main works being carried out are strengthening of the runway and aircraft apron; improved runway lighting and extension of the terminal building. The airport should reopen at the beginning of August.

Mr. Gourlay: Is the Minister not aware that since Turnhouse Airport was closed at the beginning of this month there has been little evidence of realisation of urgency to get this work done? In view of the spectacular increase in the volume of air traffic between London and Edinburgh, and particularly in view of development of tourist traffic in

Scotland, will the hon. Gentleman undertake to see that this work is kept in progress during all the daylight hours of the next few weeks?

Mr. Rippon: We shall certainly proceed with the work as fast as possible. I understand it will be carried out within the scheduled time.

Southampton Airport

Mr. J. Howard: asked the Minister of Aviation what is the present position in relation to the disposal of the remaining land within the perimeter of Southampton Airport; and, in view of the proposal to withdraw the services from the airport on 30th April, if he will make a statement.

Mr. Rippon: The former owners of the northern extension have withdrawn their offer and the land has been offered to the Southampton Corporation.
My right hon. Friend has already extended the date of withdrawal of services from 9th to 30th April when the air traffic control staff will be needed urgently elsewhere.
If arrangements to take over and carry on with the operation of the aerodrome are not made by the new owners by then, my right hon. Friend can only contemplate providing sufficient facilities for private flying for a short time thereafter, as it is impossible to justify keeping the aerodrome open at public expense indefinitely.

Mr. Howard: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the arrangements he has made for the continuance of skeleton services at the airport. May I ask whether he will use his good offices to expedite agreement on the purchase of this remaining small plot of land so that arrangements for the continuation of operations by the new owners of Southampton airport may be pushed forward?

Mr. Rippon: In this regard I think that the initiative now rests with the Southampton Corporation.

Jet Aircraft, London Airport (Incident)

Mr. Chetwynd: asked the Minister of Aviation whether he will publish the report of his investigation into the near


miss in the London Airport area on 21st February between Canadian and Egyptian jet air liners.

Mr. Thorneycroft: Neither of the aircraft was registered in the United Kingdom and in accordance with normal practice I have given the national authorities concerned an opportunity to consider the results of the investigation before deciding whether they should be published.

Mr. Chetwynd: Will the Minister bear in mind that it is very important to maintain public confidence in this country in the safety of the approaches to London Airport? In view of the report of the Cairns Committee, would not it be advisable to publish this information as soon as possible?

Mr. Thorneycroft: I think that probably is so. I share the view of the hon. Gentleman. Nevertheless it is a normal international practice, and a right one, supported by the Cairns Committee, that where foreign registered aircraft are involved the countries concerned should be given an opportunity to comment first.

Mr. Rankin: Does the right hon. Gentleman realise that once again we have had a near miss at London Airport and that, of course, this is a disturbing element in air travel? Can he say that he is satisfied with the system of control under which aircraft are brought to ground at London Airport?

Mr. Thorneycroft: Yes, Sir. I am satisfied with the system and, perhaps what is more important, it is quite clear that the pilots are satisfied with the system. They all pay very high tribute to the standard of operations in the London Traffic Control Area.

Air Transport Licensing Board (Salaries)

Mr. Chetwynd: asked the Minister of Aviation what salaries he has fixed for the members of the Air Transport Licensing Board.

Mr. Thorneycroft: Chairman £5,000, Deputy-Chairman £2,750, Board members fifteen guineas a session.

Mr. Chetwynd: In view of the amount paid to the Chairman of another public

corporation, has there been any protest from this Chairman that he is not getting the rate for the job?

Mr. Thorneycroft: No.

Sir A. V. Harvey: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there is a point of view that this is not enough to pay the Chairman of this important Board in order to get the right man for the job, in view of the fact that no pension is offered? Is he further aware that, to make this an equally satisfactory position, there should be pension rights equivalent to those of the national air corporations?

Dame Irene Ward: Call for the Chancellor.

Mr. Thorneycroft: I am anxious that the right man should be appointed. I take into account any representations made to me. I think it is a reasonable amount to pay for this post.

Sir A. V. Harvey: But there is no pension.

Flying and Gliding Clubs

Mr. Gough: asked the Minister of Aviation if he is now in a position to make a statement on the formation of a National Flying Trust for the promotion of gliding and light aeroplane flying.

Mr. Thorneycroft: Yes, Sir. Following recommendations from the Standing Joint Committee on Private Flying, the Society of British Aircraft Constructors and Shell-Mex and B.P. Ltd. have set up a fund of £100,000 to be subscribed over a period of three years. The purpose of the fund will be to make low-interest loans to flying and gliding clubs for the purchase of equipment and other essential needs, and at the end of the three years the position will be reviewed in the light of the experience gained.
I am grateful to the Society and to Shell-Mex and B.P. Ltd. for showing in this practical way the value they attach to the flying and gliding club movement.

Mr. Gough: I thank my right hon. Friend for that reply, which will be welcomed by all interested in private flying. May I ask him two questions? First, would loans under this trust be made available only to British aircraft


or to foreign aircraft as well? Secondly, can he give an assurance to the House that his Ministry will back this by helping in providing more aerodromes, otherwise the scheme will be impracticable? May I ask, particularly, whether he will help by providing Fairoaks for private flying and Croydon for business flying?

Mr. Thorneycroft: My hon. Friend's second supplementary question raises a wider point. Perhaps he will put down a Question, if he wishes to ask about particular aerodromes. The purpose of a loan is a matter between those who administer the trust and the private flying clubs. I should have thought that as the Society of British Aircraft Constructors is so prominent in the fund, there might be a certain disposition for British aircraft to have preference in this matter, although I understand that nothing of that kind is laid down.

Oral Answers to Questions — HOSPITALS

Mental Health Review Tribunals

Mr. K. Robinson: asked the Minister of Health if he is satisfied, in view of the small number of applications to mental health review tribunals, that patients detained in hospital are generally aware of the existence of the tribunals; and what steps he will take to ensure that such patients are informed of their right to apply to the tribunals for discharge.

The Minister of Health (Mr. Enoch Powell): Hospitals and mental nursing homes have been asked to give detained patients and their nearest relatives a statement of their rights, and a series of leaflets is supplied for this purpose. I have no reason to doubt that the request is being complied with.

Mr. Robinson: Nevertheless, would not the Minister agree that the number of eighty-six applications up to the middle of last month is very much smaller than anybody envisaged at the time of the passage of the Mental Health Act? Is the right hon. Gentleman quite satisfied that patients know about these tribunals?

Mr. Powell: I do not think the small number until recently is significant,

because, up to the end of April, as the hon. Member will realise, it was only a very limited number of patients who had the right to apply. We shall get a much better idea of how this is working from now onwards.

Children (Platt Report)

Mr. K. Robinson: asked the Minister of Health if he is aware that many hospitals have done little or nothing to implement the recommendations of the Platt Report on Children in Hospital, which were accepted by him; whether he has now collated the replies sent to him by hospital authorities on this subject; and what further steps he proposes to take.

Mr. Powell: The replies have been collated and I intend to publish a summary in my Annual Report. I am satisfied that the Platt Report has been thoroughly studied and that its major recommendations have been widely accepted. Implementation of some depends on new building and staffing. I shall pursue these matters with individual hospital authorities as occasion offers.

Mr. Robinson: Would not the Minister agree that the implementation of these recommendations has been disappointingly slow and that very few hospitals have even introduced a system of unrestricted visiting, but that those which have done so have found it thoroughly satisfactory for the parents and children concerned? Will he press forward with trying to get the fullest implementation of these very humane and reasonable recommendations?

Mr. Powell: Yes, indeed, and I entirely agree with what the hon. Member says about unrestricted visiting. But I think that the most effective way to follow up the Report is individually in the light of individual returns.

Mr. Robinson: Would the Minister consider publishing a list of those hospitals which allow unrestricted visiting and those which allow the mother to attend hospital with a child under five years of age?

Mr. Powell: The numbers are very large and I do not know whether it would be a good idea to burden the


OFFICIAL REPORT with them. Perhaps the hon. Member and I could look at them.

Oral Answers to Questions — MINISTRY OF HEALTH

Pre-nursing Students (Pay)

Mrs. Castle: asked the Minister of Health whether he will amend the scales of pay for pre-nursing students in order to enable them to receive the same pay increase as was awarded to nurses from 1st December last.

Mr. Powell: Yes, Sir. Increases in the maximum rates of pay are being authorised with effect from 1st April, 1961.

Mrs. Castle: I thank the Minister for that reply. May I ask whether he will go a little further, in order to encourage these pre-nursing students to feel that they are a potential part of the nursing profession, by back-dating their increase to December, 1960, in order to coincide with the date of the commencement of the most recent increase in nurses' salaries?

Mr. Powell: I entirely agree that this is a very important source of recruitment for nursing. But the adjustment of pay for nursing cadets has never been at the same time as the adjustment of pay for nurses. In fact, on the present occasion the interval is shorter.

Mr. Fernyhough: But there is no reason why it should not be.

Mr. Marsh: Can the right hon. Gentleman tell the House how the new pay scales were arrived at, and whether they were negotiated through the Whitley machine?

Mr. Powell: They are the application of the pay scales negotiated for nurses.

Prescription Charges

Sir B. Janner: asked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that the Executive Council of the National Health Service for the County Borough of Leicester has expressed full sympathy with the resolutions adopted by the Cumberland and Burton-on-Trent Executive Councils protesting against the increase in prescription charges; and whether he is taking steps to comply with the proposals of these councils.

Mr. Powell: I am aware of the Executive Council's views, but the House has taken its decision on this matter.

Sir B. Janner: Is the fact that the House has taken a decision, which is an appalling one, going to prevent the Minister from putting right what is obviously wrong? Is he aware that people are greatly disturbed about these charges, and that many people find that the whole thing is virtually impossible from their point of view because of their financial position?

Mr. Powell: I believe that this policy is as widely supported in the country as it is in the House.

Mr. K. Robinson: Is it not a fact that the London Executive Council has also protested to the Minister about these prescription charges? Would he care to tell the House how many executive councils have protested, and what attention he will pay to these responsible bodies which are very closely concerned with the problem?

Mr. Powell: I am seeing a deputation from the executive councils in the near future.

Mrs. Castle: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that Blackburn Executive Council also sent him a protest concerning this matter? Will he take up the suggestion of my hon. Friend the Member for St. Pancras, North (Mr. K. Robinson) and publish the list of all those which have protested?

Mr. Powell: This Question refers to a specific Executive Council.

ALGERIA (BRITISH NATIONALS)

Mr. Healey (by Private Notice): Mr. Healey (by Private Notice) asked the Lord Privy Seal whether he will state what action is being taken to protect British nationals in Algeria.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. J. B. Godber): I understand from Her Majesty's Consul-General in Algiers that the situation there is quiet and presents no threat to British lives and property. But the Consul-General has standing arrangements for communicating with British Subjects in case of emergency with a view to assisting the evacuation of those who might wish to leave.
In view of the developments of the last 48 hours, the House will perhaps allow me to add this. A strong and united France is vital to the freedom of the world. Anything which weakens or divides France must be regarded with profound regret in this country.
I am sure that the House would wish to go on record as expressing to the President of France and to the French people their feelings of friendship and encouragement at this time.

Mr. Healey: May I say, first, on behalf of the Opposition, how glad we are that Her Majesty's Government have expressed this sentiment, in which I think we all wholeheartedly concur, regarding as we do the mutiny in Algieria as a threat not only to the French people, but to the whole of Western policy, not only in Africa but in the world generally? May I ask him whether steps have been taken physically by Her Majesty's Services so that we shall be in a position, if necessary, to act quickly to protect British lives?

Mr. Godber: Yes, Sir. I think that I can give a definite assurance on that point.

Mr. W. Yates: Will my hon. Friend consult his right hon. Friend the Minister of Defence and consider what steps are needed in view of the fact that part of the N.A.T.O. forces will now be immobilised for a short time?

Mr. Godber: I think that that goes very much wider than the point with which I was dealing. I do not think that it would be appropriate for me to comment at this stage.

LAOS (CEASE-FIRE AND CONFERENCE)

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. J. B. Godber): With your permission, Mr. Speaker, and that of the House, I wish to make a statement on Laos.
The House will be glad to know that my noble Friend has now been able to reach agreement with the Soviet Foreign Minister on communications covering the preliminary arrangements for a cease-fire and a conference on Laos.
The three communications are being issued today by the co-Chairmen to the

various Governments concerned and will be published tomorrow. As my right hon. Friend indicated on Wednesday last, the Soviet communication to us on 16th April, which contained these texts, required considerable clarification, but I am glad to say that Mr. Gromyko has assured Her Majesty's Ambassador in Moscow of the desire of the Soviet Government for an immediate cease-fire to precede the international conference which should now meet, provided the Swiss Government concur, in Geneva on 12th May.
I hope that the House will agree that the co-operation of the Soviet Government, in calling for a cease-fire in this way, represents a decisive step forward in the difficult process of bringing peace to Laos.
Much remains to be done before the conference can meet. Arrangements for the cease-fire will have to be made between those fighting in Laos, and we are using our good offices to help them to do this. We also have to arrange for the International Control Commission to verify that the cease-fire is being observed. Any substantial violation of the cease-fire would put all these arrangements in jeopardy. We must, of course, be satisfied of the effectiveness of the cease-fire before the conference meets.

Mr. Healey: May I congratulate all the Governments concerned on their success in reaching this agreement and say that I think we must all feel that, at a time when international relations are disturbed in some parts of the world, it is most important that we should concentrate on achieving co-operation in those parts of the world where we can recognise common interests? Can the hon. Gentleman say whether the 14 Governments which it is proposed to invite to the international conference have indicated their readiness to attend should the agreements contained in the communications to be published tomorrow be carried out?

Mr. Godber: I am grateful for the earlier part of the hon. Gentleman's supplementary question. I am sure that among people all over the world there will be a sense of relief that we have got so far after the somewhat prolonged consultations.
The invitations are only now being officially sent to the 14 Governments. We have not got official assurances from them, but I hope that we shall get favourable replies within the course of the next few days.

Mr. Warbey: Can the Minister say whether the cease-fire arrangements include the cessation of military aid to either side in Laos, and whether an assurance has been received from the Soviet Union, and the United States, in particular—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why the United States in particular?"]—that no aid will be given to either side.

Mr. Godber: The question of military aid is obviously a matter about which the International Control Commission will be concerned, and the conference, when it meets, will obviously take very close cognisance of that point.

Mr. Harold Davies: Is the Minister aware that some of us also appreciate the work of Prince Souvanna Phouma in his efforts to maintain a neutral Laos? May I ask that the Government now try to use the Economic Commission for Asia and the Far East as a constructive organisation, without any strings, to go forward with the Mekong and other economic aid in other parts of the Indo-Chinese Peninsula?

Mr. Godber: I agree that Prince Souvanna Phouma has helped, but so have many other people. It is wrong to single out any individual. There have been a number of people who have been working towards this end.
On the other point, I think that it is for the conference, when it meets, to deal with this particular item.

Mr. Brockway: May I ask the Minister if British influence will be exercised to get an early decision on the matter of either Russian and American aid by way of military equipment? May I also ask him if Britain will use her influence to get the American authorities to revise their decision to put their civilian advisers into the military uniform of the Royal Government in Laos?

Mr. Godber: I think that it is perhaps best not to go into a lot of detail on these matters. There have been claims and counter-claims on both sides

with regard to these matters. I think that the important thing is to get the conference to meet and to work. I do not wish to say anything which would exacerbate this.

Mr. Paget: Is it not a little odd, in a conflict which we were assured was a local rebellion, to find the Soviet Union in a position to order a cease-fire on one side? Is it not odd that it is in a position to do so?

Mr. Godber: We can all live in hopes. I think that that is the best thing to do.

Mr. Gaitskell: Will the Minister clarify one point? When does he expect the International Control Commission to arrive in Laos to do its job?

Mr. Godber: It will be moving directly to Delhi—that was the original proposal—and as soon as it is informed that the cease-fire has taken place it will proceed to Laos to verify it in accordance with the instructions it will have received from the co-Chairmen.

Mr. M. Foot: In view of the statements which the Under-Secretary has made about Algeria and Laos, and the general welcome given them by the House, might it not be a good thing if the Government had something to say about Cuba, and what has been happening there.

OFFICIAL REPORT (DIVISION No. 142)

Mr. Fletcher: May I ask your guidance, Mr. Speaker, about an entry which appears in the OFFICIAL REPORT for last Friday, 21st April? In column 1609 there is a record of a Division which was called on an Amendment moved by the hon. Member for Tiverton (Mr. Maxwell-Hyslop) to the Carriage by Air Bill. The Amendment is recorded as having been lost, and the record shows that there voted for the Ayes 29 and for the Noes 30. Then it appears that the hon. Gentleman the Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir P. Agnew) and the hon. Gentleman the Member for Hendon, North (Mr. C. Ian Orr-Ewing), the Civil Lord of the Admiralty, curiously enough, voted for both the Ayes and the Noes.
It may, of course, be that there is an error in the record. I was myself in the Ayes Lobby and noted both those hon. Members there. If, therefore, the entry of their having voted for the Noes, as one must assume, is incorrect, the result, of course, is that the Amendment, instead of having been lost, was carried.
It did seem to me that in those circumstances you might wish to investigate the matter so that, if one was right in one's conclusion, the House might have another opportunity of coming to a decision.
May I add this? If, on the other hand, it be the case that both those hon. Members voted in both Lobbies, then, while that would be an inconvenience, to say the least, at all times, it must be particularly confusing on such a narrow vote, and, of course, if it became habitual it would affect the question whether a quorum was present when votes of this kind in a small House were taken.

Mr. Speaker: Yes, I follow that one. I think that it may be that the hon. Member is a bit more lucky than some of us. I have recollections in the past of such things as this happening. The position is that we cannot have any personal explanations about this, because no application has been made to me to make them. It is, I think, an acknowledged practice that if an hon. Member inadvertently votes in the wrong Lobby—and that has, I think, happened—and if he has time to do so, he can cure his error by going through the other Lobby also, in which case the matter appears in the OFFICIAL REPORT as it appears here. I think that there is no more sinister explanation to be attached to what the hon. Member has found, but I am obliged to him for raising it.

EAST-WEST TRADE (DEVELOPMENT)

3.43 p.m.

Mr. G. B. H. Currie: I beg to move,
That this House, being conscious of the necessity for the expansion of the exports of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to countries overseas, urges Her Majesty's Government to give every encouragement to those firms who endeavour to increase their exports to the countries of the Planned Economy Group, and asks Her Majesty's Government, when negotiating trade agreements with these countries, to have particular regard to the contributions that can be made by the Northern Ireland shipbuilding, heavy engineering, textile and electrical industries.
I have no personal financial interest of any sort in the outcome of this Motion, nor, indeed, have I any financial interest other than the interest of an ordinary back bench Member of Parliament in moving the Motion. Having cleared that out of the way I should like to say that my interest in the subject matter of the debate is solely that of the development of trade, of securing, so far as possible, a steadily improving friendly relationship in international affairs through trade, and in furthering the interests of this country not only in trade, but in international affairs.
I hope that when this Motion has been fully discussed we shall be able to go away with the feeling that at least some of the problems have been brought out into the open for discussion and that the relationship between the countries of the West and those countries to which I refer as the countries of the planned economy group will have been brought closer together.
In opening the debate, I realise that I am by this Motion raising not only great questions of international trade, but problems of a political nature as well. It may be argued by some right hon. and hon. Members that an increase in the flow of trade between East and West would be likely to undermine the security of the Western nations. Indeed, it may be argued that it would be likely to undermine N.A.T.O. itself against the advance of Communist ideology from behind the Iron Curtain. In considering that possibility, I think that it is wise to bear in mind what was said by Mr. Diefenbaker in the Albert Hall as


recently as 4th November, 1958, when he is reported as having said:
Trade has become a major weapon in the Communist world offensive. First, it was the U.S.S.R., and now Red China has joined in an Asiatic trade onslaught intended to capture markets and with and through them the minds of free men.
The views of such an experienced and such an astute politician as Mr. Diefenbaker, expressed so recently in this country, must, I think, make us pause and make us give very weighty consideration to the problems before we pass this Motion in this House this afternoon.
We must also, I think, when we are discussing this Motion, have in mind what Lenin wrote in his memorandum on the "Basic Considerations for Setting up a People's Commissariat for Foreign Trade." Let me just remind the House of what was said in some of those memoranda. I would quote this extract:
The governing classes, the financial aristocracy, the bourgeoisie and the democratic idealists are deaf mutes ideologically and all plans must take this into account.
He went on to say:
In order to conquer these countries we must express our eagerness, our very great eagerness, to set up friendly trade relations with the capitalist countries on a basis of complete non-intervention in their internal politics. The deaf mutes will believe this. They will be delighted to open their doors wide. Through them the Comintern agents will speedily find their way as our trade representatives. The deaf mute capitalist money makers will be so eager to conquer the Soviet market that they will shut their eyes to the truth. They will grant us credits which will be used to supply with funds the Communist organisations in their countries. Meanwhile, by supplying all kinds of products they will strengthen and perfect our war industry, which will be essential for our future attacks and victories over our suppliers.
That is the extract, but he went on to say—and this may be an illuminating portion of his speech—
Telling the troth is a bourgeois prejudice. In so far as they are effective, lies are justified.
That is the background against which we must look as we discuss this Motion. Bearing in mind what Lenin said in his memorandum, and the warnings given recently by Mr. Diefenbaker in the Albert Hall, we must consider whether, since Mr. Khrushchev took over the reins of office in the Soviet Union, there has been a change of outlook and a change

in the strategic plans of the Eastern bloc of nations. We must also decide whether it would be safe for us to engage in any further degree of trade with the nations of the East, or whether we would be committing a dangerous act of folly to trade further than we are at present.
Although I am not convinced that there has been any substantial change in the general strategic plan of the Communist countries, the matter cannot rest there. We must look further as we discuss this Motion.
Consequent on the tragic and costly blunders of American statesmen which were made towards the end of the last war, a number of once free, once independent and once proud States found themselves behind the Iron Curtain. They found themselves no longer free men, able to practice their democratic way of life, but committed to the Communist system. How different it might have been if, in 1620, the Plymouth rock had landed on the Pilgrim fathers, instead of the event having happened the other way round. That, however, is the position today, with many once free nations behind the Iron Curtain.
Some of them, particularly in matters of trade, are looking towards the West. We must, therefore, consider whether, if we refuse to trade or to increase our trade with them, we would be driving them irretrievably behind the Iron Curtain. Having considered that point, we must then decide whether we would not, in refusing to trade with them, be closing a door which we can to some extent throw open by trade, and thus keep alive the possibility that some day they may once again become free States.
I have little difficulty in coming to a decision on this problem. I strongly advocate that we should encourage the flow and development of trade between Britain and what are known as the satellite countries. I pose this question with regard to Russia and Communist China: are we to withhold our trade from them, and so perpetuate the tension that has existed since 1945? If we withhold our trade on the grounds that we have a different form of Government, a different outlook on life, and a different approach to the freedom of the individual, surely we are shutting the very door through which we can talk, through


which we can show them our way of life, and through which, eventually, we may be able to persuade them that the best interests of their people are very similar to the interests of the people of the free Western nations.
Through trade, sporting events and the development of cultural approaches between the peoples of different countries, we may find the best method of preserving peace. With knowledge of the Lenin plan, we must accept the challenge and the fact that we must trade for peace. There can be no one in any country who, voluntarily, would commit his nation to the devastations of a nuclear war. Therein lies the distinction between events as they are today and events as they were at the time when Lenin wrote his memorandum. In those days, war did not adopt that look of utter desolation which it adopts today.
By trade—and I use a quotation that has been used many times in this House—
Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
I was glad to learn that my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade is going to Moscow next month to open the British Trade Fair there. I am told that this fair has been organised as a result of information already given as to the type of equipment required by the industrialists in Russia and in the Eastern countries. The fair will be a great shop window for Britain in Moscow, but it is also to be, I am told, a shop window showing those goods which manufacturers in this country know to be in demand in Moscow and in the Russian States.
In my speech I shall confine myself to the development of trade between the United Kingdom and the German Democratic Republic and Hungary, and I must refer to the part that the Northern Ireland industries might be able to contribute towards the development of this trade. I have very little particularised knowledge of the potentialities of trade with Russia or Communist China, but I am hoping that some right hon. and hon. Gentlemen who have more profound knowledge of this subject will be able to inform the House of its potentiality.
At the beginning of March this year I was privileged—with my wife, I am

glad to say—to go out to the Leipzig Spring Fair, held in the German Democratic Republic. It was my first visit to the fair which, I believe, is the largest in the world. It was also my first visit to the German Democratic Republic. I was astonished by the magnitude of the fair and by the number of firms from all countries which were showing at it with a view to obtaining orders for their products. Almost every manufacturing nation was represented.
The United States, despite McCarthy-ism, was represented by the cream of the American steel industry. France—that unhappy country today—was represented by numerous exhibitors, and so was West Germany. Great Britain was represented by exhibits of tractors, motor-cycles, machinery, textiles, steel, electrical goods and numerous other manufactures. I am glad to say that Northern Ireland was also represented by the firm of James Mackie, which manufactures some of the best textile machinery in the world and which has supplied continental needs for a great number of years now.
I found it difficult to understand how it came about that some Western countries which had done their best to prevent this country from developing its trade with the German Democratic Republic came to be showing their products at the fair, which they had tried to proscribe as far as we were concerned. It has been said that example is always more efficacious than precept and I should have thought that when they were trying to persuade us to keep away from the fair they might have stayed away themselves, but the contrary was the case.
Since I tabled this Motion, Cmnd. Paper 1329, United Kingdom Balance of Payments, 1958–60, has been published and we have also had the Chancellor's most remarkably able Budget speech. I shall not weary the House by repeating the figures given in the White Paper, or in the Chancellor's speech. They are sufficiently fresh in the minds of right hon. and hon Members for it to be unnecessary for me to repeat even the figures for the balance of trade. But those figures emphasise again to us all the importance of our balance of payments and the great necessity that we should increase our drive


for exports and increase our productivity. I do not think that any of us are in conflict on those morals which we must draw from the White Paper and the Chancellor's speech.
I believe that the Budget proposals will prove to be a great stimulus to our export drive, though I have some reservations about what my right hon. and learned Friend had to say on the imposition of a tax on the number of persons employed in an industry and also on the powers which he has retained in his own hands to impose a discriminatory additional form of Purchase Tax. Those two proposals could be quite devastating to our situation in Northern Ireland, and I greatly hope that in the near future we shall have a statement made on behalf of the Chancellor to the effect that neither of these financial proposals will be employed in respect of any of our industries in Northern Ireland; and certainly as long as we have anything like the much too substantial unemployment that exists there at present.
As a country living by its foreign trade, Britain must be continually searching for world markets where the possibilities are growing and, as a result of industrialisation, the type of manufactured goods in which Britain excels are likely to be in increasing demand. At present, industrial growth in Russia, China and Eastern Europe is estimated to be about 10 per cent. per annum. In some countries it is more and in some rather less, but that is the general overall figure behind the Iron Curtain. The pattern of their trade is moving in the very direction in which this country, as an exporter of highly technical manufactured goods, should particularly welcome. I am certain that there are vast potentialities for the expansion of our trade in those countries.
In 1960, according to figures which I obtained today, the total of all exports from all Western countries to the planned economy countries amounted to £792·2 million. Britain's share of this vast figure was a miserable £107·8 million. The figure for Western Germany was £272·2 million or more than one-third of all the trade. If, as I suggest, the markets of the planned economy group are expanding at such pace, we should offer the

same import facilities into this country as we allow to our competitors in Western Europe, including the countries of the European Common Market which are raising tariff barriers against us.
We impose a highly discriminatory system of import licensing against the goods of the Eastern bloc and, at the same time, farcically enough, by that very action denying them the possibility of earning the necessary sterling to finance the substantial orders for British engineering and other goods which they wish to place in this country. It is a most ludicrous situation. In addition, is it not absurd that we should have a greater restriction on travel by buyers from the German Democratic Republic to this country than there is on their travelling to the German Federal Republic?
Surely, also, it is a calculated insult to the citizens of the German Democratic Republic that, although we know where they come from, we should st11 insist on their being described on their travel documents as "presumed to be German." They are Germans. We know that they are Germans. We know the places there. Surely, their travel documents might describe them as being German.
Under the existing quadripartite machinery by which temporary travel documents are granted, our trade rivals in the other Western countries can block the travel of any prospective customer whom they know wishes to come to this country to place an order. It is the easiest thing in the world to get the order oneself by blocking the travel or a customer's to one's trade rival. Nothing could be simpler.
It is absurd, also, that British European Airways should not be allowed to fly a service from here to Eastern Germany—if we like to call it by that name, or the G.D.R.—whereas other Western European countries can run services not only to Eastern Germany, but to Great Britain as well. This was made appallingly obvious at the time of the Leipzig Trade Fair, when one could fly from Eastern Germany to another Western country and then from that Western country to London, but one could not fly in a B.E.A. aeroplane for that journey.
For the past two years, trade between Britain and Eastern Germany has been regulated by an agreement


entered into between the Federation of British Industries and the Chamber of Foreign Trade of the German Democratic Republic. That is, of course, consequent on the fact that the German Democratic Republic does not exist! This year the agreement was greatly delayed as a result of difficulties that arose between Eastern and Western Germany. It was concluded only on the eve of the Leipzig Trade Fair.
I am glad to say that that was a rather better agreement than the previous year's agreement, but the effect of this great delay was that when our exporters got out to the fair they discovered that the trade agreement had just been concluded and that their competitors had "pinched" nearly all the trade and our people, the export drivers, were left to take what they could get of what was left.
It is useful to contrast the way in which these matters are conducted by this country with the method used by certain other countries. I am told that in France, Belgium and Italy there are special Government bodies on which sit representatives of all their various economic Ministries for the purpose of negotiating trade with the German Democratic Republic. Each of the bodies set up by these countries has its own representative in West Berlin for the purpose of dealing directly with the East German Trade Ministry that is concerned with whatever may be the particular product about which they are negotiatting. I am sure that we could give consideration to setting up a similar sort of organisation which would have its representative on the spot. Last year, our trade with Eastern Germany amounted to £14 million; this year, as I have said, the negotiated figure has gone up to £18 million.
While I was in Leipzig, with Lord Boothby and a number of my hon. Friends—I do not know why those concerned were from this side of the House only, although I did notice some hon. Members opposite in Leipzig at the time—we had an intimate interview with Herr Ulbricht, the Chairman of the Council of State of the G.D.R., and with two of his Ministers. We had to make it clear to him that we were in Leipzig as private Members of Parliament, and that nothing we said in any way com-

mitted Her Majesty's Government—indeed, that our views would not necessarily be anything like the views of Her Majesty's Government. Nevertheless, it was interesting to have the discussion. Herr Ulbricht spoke of his country's desire for peace—and anyone who has seen Dresden, and the devastation of many parts of Eastern Germany, can well understand the desire for peace of the Eastern German people.
Herr Ulbricht spoke of their wish that we should engage in trade with each other and of his desire to enter into not merely an annual agreement, but a trade agreement that would last for twenty years. When we look at the picture it is easy to see why he wanted such a long-term agreement. There were discussions some months ago about the purchase, by East Germany I think, of a steel strip mill. The order was worth about £60 million.
That order went to another Western country, but it is obvious that such a valuable article, such an immense machine, could not possibly be constructed within one year, and Herr Ulbricht's obvious desire that was that where large plant is required it should be possible to spread the negotiations so that he would not find, for example, that when one-tenth of the mill had been constructed the trade agreement closed down and he was left without the other nine-tenths. I believe that that was the sort of thing he had in mind when he said that he would like to be able to arrange a trade agreement for a period of about twenty years.
Herr Ulbricht also visualised—and now I realise that I am getting on to dangerous ground—that Germany would be divided for a very long time. I must confess that I share his view, and that I would have the greatest trepidation were I to learn tomorrow, or in a week or a month or a year hence, that the two parts of Germany had been brought together again, either in the West or behind the Iron Curtain.
I have already said that the volume of trade done between this country and the planned economy countries last year was £107·8 million. What a very insignificant trade agreement this is that has been entered into between this country and Eastern Germany; but, if I may, I should like to leave it to others


to develop the more intimate and more particularised figures of East German trade, and turn to trade with Hungary.
Exports last year from this country to Hungary amounted to £4·3 million. West German trade with Hungary amounted to £188 million. France exported £6·7 million worth of goods to Hungary, and Italy's trade with Hungary came to the value of £7·6 million. Here again, we were left far behind when compared with these other countries. Our balance of trade with Hungary was exactly even. We imported and exported exactly £4·3 million worth of goods, so it cannot be said that this balance is an argument against the increase of our trade with Hungary.
To return for one moment to our trade with Eastern Germany, I was told that the East Germans had bought their maximum amount from this country, but we had not purchased to our maximum amount from them, so this country was left in balance of trade with Eastern Germany.
Just over a week ago, I had the privilege of meeting a group of Hungarian industrialists who came to this country with a view to exploring the possibility of placing orders for engineering and other machinery which, hitherto, they had purchased from Western Germany. I am glad to say that, in all probability, one order at least will come from Hungary to a Northern Ireland firm manufacturing textile machinery. There is, of course, the qualification, and one which we have to look at in all these trade discussions, that our price must be competitive with the price quoted by other nations.
At the outset, I disclaimed any financial interest in East-West trade. My interest lies in the fact that at present in Northern Ireland 36,338 persons are registered as being out of work. I recognise the valuable work which has been done by the Government of Northern Ireland, under the inspired guidance of Lord Brookeborough, to create jobs for those who are unemployed. Already, the new Minister of Commerce, Mr. Andrews, is showing fresh drive in that Ministry, in the efforts being made in the Province to obtain new industries and new orders.
I recognise, also, the assurances of sympathy and desire to help which Her

Majesty's Government have given to us all in Northern Ireland and also the financial help which has been afforded to Northern Ireland. But the problem requires more than expressions of sympathy. It requires even more than that of making available about £8¾ million a year over the next five years. The number on our unemployment register rose last year by 6,000. We have the highest birth rate and the lowest death rate in any part of the United Kingdom, so one can understand the rise in unemployment. That number of new jobs must be created before we can begin to attack the unemployment problem. We have to fill 6,000 new jobs before we get back an unemployed man into a job.
In the very near future, I am sorry to say, my information is that about 3,000 men will probably find themselves out of work additionally at Harland and Woolf, as soon as a vessel which is almost completed sets sail. These will be most of the men engaged and helping in the finishing trade in the shipbuilding industry. We have a shipyard second to none in the quality of its work. It is, I believe, the largest in the United Kingdom, if not in the whole of the world. If we cannot get orders for ships, as seems to be the position in the United Kingdom at present, our shipbuilders must see whether they can get orders from abroad.
I am not convinced that some of our older directors in the shipbuilding industry—and this applies not only in Belfast, but elsewhere—are giving sufficient energy and drive to getting orders for ships from other countries. Indeed, I know of at least one inquiry made from behind the Iron Curtain which got no further than the inquiry stage. Having said that concerning management, I should also like—and I think that it is within the framework of this debate—to say that demarcation is another matter which will have to be looked at if we are to compete successfully with the shipbuilding yards abroad and get orders for our ships. Victoriana in management and Luddite trade unionism must both go and we must make a fresh approach to obtain orders for ships from abroad.
In Northern Ireland, we have many go-ahead firms, like James Mackie, which, over the years, have built up a


big reputation on the Continent, and also firms like Davidson and Company, which manufactures industrial fans and allied equipment. Short and Harland manufacture not only aircraft, but computors. Belfast Ropeworks do an export trade in ropes. We have our linen and textile factories, but I recognise that there is a special linen problem in respect of our East-West trade. We have in Cyril Lord carpets the largest carpet factory in Europe, fortunately in my constituency. We have many other firms whose names could be given by the Belfast Chamber of Commerce to industrialists who are anxious to get in touch with them.
We in Northern Ireland are anxious to increase our contribution to United Kingdom exports. As an integral part of the United Kingdom we would benefit greatly by an increase in the export trade. We think that we could reduce our unemployment figure to some extent by exports. Like the rest of the United Kingdom we are anxious to work for a better understanding between the nations of the world. We believe that trade is one way in which we can help in that direction. Surely it is worth the effort. We would welcome in this debate the encouragement, if nothing more, of Her Majesty's Government in our endeavours to develop East-West trade.

4.30 p.m.

Mr. Arthur Lewis: I should like, first, to congratulate the hon. Member for Down, North (Mr. Currie) on selecting this Motion for debate and the admirable way in which he moved it. I think that most, if not all, of the back benchers on both sides of the House will agree with What he has said, and I hope that even the Minister will be able to do so as well.
Like the hon. Member, I, too, wish to declare an interest. For many years I have been attempting, in my small way, to extend East-West trade generally and with East Germany in particular. Long before the hon. Member went to Leipzig I was in the habit of going there—incidentally, at my own expense, with no question of financial gain. The hon. Member for Louth (Mr. C. Osborne) laughs, but not only did I pay my own expenses, but I was out of pocket. I had no means other than my Parliamentary salary, and in those days there was no

question of companies meeting one's expenses.
For some years I have done my utmost to help to sell Britain and British products. I think that it was at the Spring Fair, in 1959, that I had the pleasure—some may say the undoubted honour—of conducting Mr. Khrushchev around some of the exhibits at the British Pavilion. On that occasion, without any personal, direct or indirect interest, I took the opportunity of saying to Mr. Khrushchev, "This is made by the X company, which is one of the finest companies in the world to make these products." Not only did Mr. Khrushchev show an immense interest in our exhibits, but I found, with respect, that he knew much more about the products, who made them and where they were made, than many people in this country.
As I have said, I have done everything possible for some years to encourage East-West trade generally and with the German Democratic Republic in particular. The reason is that I knew the Deputy Minister for Trade in East Germany very well, and I tried to get him to agree to give more export opportunities to Britain than had hitherto been the case. The hon. Member for Down, North said that when he was at Leipzig he was surprised to notice the size of the fair and the large number of Western countries exhibiting there. The truth is that this has been going on for years. Most, if not all, of the Western countries have been exhibiting, but one of the major exhibitors has been West Germany.
Whatever the Minister may say, the West Germans have for years been opposed to Britain doing trade with East Germany and have put every obstacle in the way of this trade, allegedly because they claim that if Britain were to trade with East Germany it might lead to political recognition of East Germany, though the real reason is that they know that if Britain were to trade with East Germany on a bare competition basis, Britain might place with East Germany orders which otherwise would go to West Germany.
Unfortunately, we have fallen for this approach by the West Germans, and I think that the Board of Trade and the Foreign Office are to blame for this. Whenever the West Germans have objected, the matter has gone through


the usual channels to the Foreign Office, or to the Board of Trade, and every difficulty has been raised. As the hon. Member has said, towards the end of last year there were to have been discussions on the new trade agreement between the F.B.I, and the East German Chamber of Commerce. It is also a fact that towards the autumn of last year the West Germans broke off their trade agreement.
Strangely enough, we found the same difficulties encouraged here. The East Germans wanted to come to this country to discuss placing large contracts with such reputable companies as Pye, but we found that the East German technicians and businessmen were unable to come here. They were unable to get travel permits. Strange as it may seem, because East Germany is not recognised in diplomatic channels, East Germans have to get a travel document, and, although they may have the necessary permission to travel, they are not allowed into this country without a travel document.
It would appear that when the West Germans did not want Herr Schmidt or Harr Braun in East Germany to come here, they did not come because they could not get their travel documents. They would end up in West Germany, in Hanover, or in Hamburg, and discuss with the West German industrialists the same type of contract which they wanted to discuss in Britain. That is stupid and ludicrous. It is no good the Board of Trade saying that this did not happen. The hon. Member for Skipton (Mr. Drayson) will recollect that on one occasion he and I tried to raise this matter as a general principle when somebody wanted to come to this country to attend an agricultural exhibition and to place an order, but was prevented from coming. This order was not placed with us, but a few weeks later we read in the Press that an almost identical order was placed with the West Germans.
The hon. Member for Down, North referred to a steel strip mill contract. The position is rather strange, because a Board of Trade spokesman recently said that we had not lost the contract and that it was still open. I would like to get the matter quite clear. Is it true that this contract is still under negotiation, or is it true that the French have obtained

it? There has since been the Government's statement about extended credit facilities, but is it true that when this matter was first raised, and the East Germans wanted long-term credits, which British manufacturers were willing to obtain for them through the Export Credits Guarantee Department, the British manufacturers came up against a brick wall so that the contract finally went to the French? There are dozens of such cases, where, if there had been Government help and assistance, this country could have obtained large contracts with East Germany.
The hon. Member for Down, North said that when he was at the Leipzig Spring Fair he found trade representatives from various Western countries present. I pay tribute to the exhibits of the British exhibitors, but the hon. Member will agree with me that, excellent as was our steel pavilion, for instance, it did not compare with what Britain could and should have been able to do. Compared with the Soviet pavilion, the Czech pavilion, or the French pavilion, it was if not shabby then somewhat inferior, especially in view of what could have been done with assistance from the Board of Trade.
The Board of Trade says that this is because we do not recognise East Germany. For many years, I have asked the Board of Trade to send representatives officially or unofficially to fairs of this kind. Almost every other country sends official or unofficial representatives. At the Leipzig Fair, West Germany had its Minister for Trade, Dr. Lemmer, who had discussions with the East German Minister of Trade, as he then was, to whom the hon. Member for Down, North spoke, His Excellency Minister Rau, who has since died, and to whose work I pay a sincere tribute. He tried in every way possible to establish better relationships, political and trading, between his country and Britain. During those negotiations there were discussions in Berlin between him and Dr. Lemmer, although the West Germans say that we should have nothing to do with East Germany and even though the Board of Trade does not send representatives to these fairs because we do not recognise East Germany.
That is a stupid approach. It may be that the President of the Board of Trade


would not like to go himself, or to send the Parliamentary Secretary, but it is not impossible to arrange for someone from his Department to have a look at these fairs without committing Britain or the Government. It is not impossible to arrange for such an official to have a holiday in March, so that at least he could have a look around. British exhibitors need to have someone to whom they can turn and need to know that help and support are being given. British exhibitors have great difficulty about putting on a show which is worth seeing, for their efforts are nothing in comparison with what could and should be done if help and assistance were given by the Board of Trade.
I am pleased to see that the President of the Board of Trade is to go to Moscow on 19tlh May. He is officially to open the British Fair in Moscow. I wish him every success and I congratulate him. While he is in Moscow, he will see Ministers and Deputy Ministers, businessmen and industrialists and technicians from Russia, China, Bulgaria, Hungary, Roumania and the German Democratic Republic. Is he to say that he will speak to the Russian technicians and Ministers and other Communist representatives, but not the Minister from the German Democratic Republic? Of course, he will not. If he talks to the East German Minister about trade and commerce while he is in Moscow, why should he not go to Leipzig and talk to him there?
The question of official recognition is a red herring which the West Germans have drawn across the trail. I hope that in the months ahead the Board of Trade will take the opportunity of helping British businessmen to extend their trade with East Germany. There is an enormous potential for the sale of almost every type of British goods and machinery in East Germany, if encouragement is given.
The East Germans need foreign currency and, obviously, cannot import unless they can earn the currency to pay for the goods. I do not see why long-term credit should not given to them. The hon. Member for Down, North said that 36,000 people were unemployed in Northern Ireland. They will have to get help from National Insurance and National Assistance. If that costs £x a week, as it will, would it not be better to work out a system of giving the East

Germans credit to that equivalent to allow them to place a few orders for ships and textile machinery in Northern Ireland? It is better to have British and Irish workmen working at the bench than drawing unemployment pay and National Assistance. With the right help and encouragement and long-term credits, long-term trade could be established with East Germany.
The same is true of China, which I visited in 1954, when I met various Ministers. They said that they were anxious to trade with Britain, even in preference to Russia in those days. They thought that British machinery and plant and equipment was better and more advanced than Russian, and hence they wanted a trade agreement with Britain. We did not encourage that trade and since then plant has been set up in China, with Russian aid, and the Chinese would now be in difficulties about switching trade to this country, even if they wanted to do so. On a long-term basis, we would have nothing to lose by assisting those countries which are in the process of industrialising their economies. The same is true of Hungary or Roumania.
Only last Friday, addressing the Russian Section of the British Chamber of Commerce at a luncheon, a Russian trade representative said that the Russians wanted to sell more oil and petrol to Britain, but that we would not allow those products to come in. He said that if the Russians could earn sterling by the sale of oil and petrol exported to us, they could buy from us ships and textile machinery and other products. It is ludicrous that we should be short of dollars and yet insist on spending dollars on importing American oil and petrol in preference to what we could get from Russia. It would be impracticable to try to get all our oil and petrol from non-dollar markets, but I see no reason why we should not allow the Russians to earn the sterling with which they could buy plant and equipment from British firms.
Before the war, a fair amount of Russian oil products were sold in this country. I do not see why the Government should go out of their way to help the present petrol and oil monopoly here. They say that they are in favour of competition. If so, when the President of the Board of Trade goes to


Moscow, let him agree to help the Russians to export oil and petrol to us, so that they will be able to earn the sterling to buy the many products of which I understand there are to be excellent exhibits in Moscow.
The strategic embargo list is stupid and it is time that the Ministers concerned—the Board of Trade, the security Ministries and others—got down to discussing it with the Americans. It does not make sense. It covers categories of goods which are held to be of strategic value. I am connected with the semiconductor industry, which deals with such things as electronics, diodes and transistors. The list covers such equipment. This industry is not allowed to export its equipment to a number of planned economy countries, but the Russians have sent a man into space in a sputnik loaded with transistors and semi-conductors, many of which are far more advanced than those which we produce. They have the plant and equipment to make high frequency mesa types of transistors which we do not have.
I do not have permission to quote his name, but I will reveal his name privately if I am required, but the other day I was speaking to a noble Lord who is one of the biggest industrialists in this country. He said that about eighteen months ago he had attended a lecture given by senior Russian scientists from the Moscow Academy of Scientists.
After the lecture a printed hand-out of the lecture was provided. I was told, "After hearing the lecture, and reading it, I still did not understand much about it and I put it on one side. About twelve months afterwards I received something marked, 'Top Secret, not to be disclosed'. It came from one of our security departments. It struck me that I had read this before and I turned up the hand-out from the lecture which the Russians had given twelve months previously. It was almost word for word the same as the document which I had just received from the security department marked, 'Top Secret'".
That is the situation. In many spheres the Russians are further advanced than we are, but we will not allow our manufacturers to supply plant and equipment to them, although in many cases the

Russians are making the same plant and equipment as well, if not better.
I ask the Minister to try to get the Americans to see the wisdom of removing some of these items from the strategic embargo list because the way in which the list works at present is ludicrous. As the Minister knows, frequently a big contract for a complete line, costing perhaps £250,000–£750,000, would be placed but for the fact that one machine, essential for the whole line, is on the strategic embargo list and the Ministry—I do not blame the Minister—cannot agree to the export of that one item. As a result, the whole contract is lost. Yet in the country which would place the order they have the same kind of machine, or a similar machine, operating, and they say, "If we cannot have all this line exported to us and if we have to make one piece of it, we might as well do the whole job ourselves".
Hon. Members may ask why they do not make these things themselves in any event. The reason is that they do not want to concentrate on some of these jobs when they have other important developments to carry on and lines to expand.
I wish the Moscow Trade Fair every success and I wish the Minister every success in his endeavours. I feel that he has done and is doing a very good job. I have met many British businessmen, and I know that they and some of our top industrialists and company executives will be there. This fair will do nothing but good. I ask the Minister whether, between now and the next Leipzig Spring Fair, he will give some active assistance to enable the same British exhibitors to exhibit at the Leipzig Fair, which is the centre of East-West trade. The British Fair in Moscow will be limited perhaps to one or two countries, whereas at Leipzig all the East-West countries will be assembled. The Americans, the French, the Germans, the Italians and, of course, all the countries of the Eastern bloc will be there. If we want to get into these Eastern markets it is imperative that we should give more assistance in the future than has been given in the past.

4.58 p.m.

Mr. John Rodgers: I am sure that we are all agreed that my hon. Friend the Member for Down, North


(Mr. Currie) has done us and, incidentally, his constituents in Northern Ireland a great service in choosing this subject for our debate this afternoon. To my mind, we give insufficient attention in this House to the problems of industry, commerce and trade, which, after all, are the foundations of our progress and prosperity. If things were going swimmingly there would be some excuse for this, but we all know that the problem which faces the country most urgently at the moment is that of our exports. I am certain that this is a subject, very much the concern of my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, which we ought to debate.
There is an idea prevalent in parts of the House and the country that the Government are not interested in trying to further an increase in trade between the East and the West. I believe that nothing could be further from the truth. My right hon. Friends the Minister of State and the President of the Board of Trade do all they can to expand trade between our country, the Soviet bloc and China. They pay personal visits, they receive deputations and delegations, they encourage groups to go to the various countries, and they receive groups of industrialists in this country—and they are having considerable success. Anything which adds to our physical exports from this country and helps in our balance of payments problem is a matter to which they give the greatest attention, and it is not true to suggest, as the hon. Member for West Ham, North (Mr. A. Lewis) seemed to suggest, that the Government are dragging their feet in the matter of East-West trade.
There are difficulties, and I shall come to them. Practically every week hon. Members who read the excellent publication, the Board of Trade Journal, which is not exactly exciting but is full of good information, will read of new orders which have been gained for British exports to countries behind the Iron Curtain. In this current issue there is reference to a £3 million contract for a paper mill to Yugoslavia—I mention that in particular, because the Motion refers to countries "of the Planned Economy Group", and not specifically to the Sino-Soviet bloc; a dust-collecting plant for Soviet Russia, worth £500,000; diesel engines worth £150,000; recording equipment for Roumania; life rafts

for Russian ships; and various other goods of that nature. These are export orders recently secured for this country in large part as a result of the efforts of the Ministers and the servants of the Board of Trade in the policy which they are pursuing.
Obviously, we should all like to increase the flow of East-West trade and I do not think that we are inhibited from doing so by any ideological differences. These exist, but they are not the inhibiting factor. We ought to realise that there are serious difficulties in making a great increase in trade between Britain and the Sino-Soviet bloc. Basically, the Soviet bloc follows a policy of self-sufficiency, which means that trade with the United Kingdom is secondary to trade with the other Socialist countries. Continually one reads of the Soviet Russia urging the satellite countries to increase their trade with the other Socialist countries to the detriment of Western Europe, including this country.
The Soviet bloc normally trades through the medium of bilateral trade agreements. The objective is that, country by country, they shall balance their imports and exports. As an earnest of our desire to co-operate with the Soviet bloc we have concluded bilateral arrangements with all the countries of the Soviet bloc with the exception of Albania, and we have even an unofficial trade agreement with East Germany, between the F.B.I, and the East German Chamber of Trade. The agreement has been made in that form because we do not recognise East Germany.
Those who have given serious thought to the problems of the export industries appreciate without my having to argue the point that there would be a tremendous boost to East-West trade if we could replace the bilateral agreements with a multilateral trading system, if only the Russians would subscribe to this policy. There would then be a far greater expansion of trade between this country, on the one hand, and Soviet Russia, the satellite countries and China, on the other.
Even without this multilateral trading, it is as well to ask ourselves how trade progresses between the United Kingdom and the Soviet bloc. Until we were supplanted by West Germany in the 1950s we had the biggest share of East-West trade.


I admit that it was still considerably smaller than pre-war trade. Today, it is true, West Germany has about twice as much trade as we have in this sector. In reply to a Question last July, the Minister of State said that Britain's total direct trade with the Sino-Soviet bloc had increased by 15 per cent. in 1959 compared with 1958 and by 43 per cent. in the first five months of 1960. Those are the most up-to-date figures I have. When the Minister replies perhaps he will give the most up-to-date figures of trade between the United Kingdom and the Soviet satellites.

Mr. A. Lewis: The hon. Member said that one of the reasons why we have not increased our trade was that the Russians will not agree to multilateral trading. At the same time, the West Germans have doubled their trade with the Soviet Union, as he rightly said, whereas we have fallen behind. Can he explain the reasons for this? How have the Germans doubled their trade when we have not?

Mr. Rodgers: I shall talk in a few moments about a visit I made to Poland, when I saw what the West Germans are doing there. I hope that that will partly answer the question.
What prevents an increase in trade between Britain, on the one hand, and the Soviet Union and the satellite countries, on the other, when all of them genuinely desire to buy more from this country? First, one reason is the very existence of the bilateral trading arrangements. Last June, I had the privilege of paying a visit to Poland, as a guest of the Polish Government. I met the Deputy Prime Minister, the Minister for Foreign Trade, the Deputy Foreign Minister and others. They were most anxious to impress upon me that they would like to buy a great deal of our manufacturing machinery and the like in preference to buying from Western Germany, if only we would make more sterling available to them.
I am sure that my Polish friends, who, incidentally, treated me with the utmost warmth, friendship and courtesy—in fact, I have seldom had a warmer welcome in any country in the world than I had in this short visit to Poland—were sincere in their desire and the statement of their

desire to buy more from Britain. But there are difficulties, as I tried to explain to them. In spite of these difficulties, the extent of our trade with Poland is not so bad. In 1957, United Kingdom exports to Poland decreased by 2 per cent., but in 1958 and 1959 they increased by 15 per cent. and 47 per cent., while United Kingdom imports from Poland increased by 10 per cent. in 1958 and by 26 per cent. in 1959.
I should point out that our trade with Poland represents about half the trade with the satellite countries. Next in order of trading, following Poland, is Czechoslovakia, followed by East Germany, Hungary, Roumania, and Bulgaria, in that order, with Albania nowhere.
Why cannot we buy more from Poland and from the other satellite countries to enable them to buy more machinery, making tyres, textiles and plastics, for example, new machine tools, electric generating stations, industrial "know-how"—which they are very anxious to purchase—and even more consumer goods, such as Irish linen, in which my hon. Friend the Member for Down, North is interested? The difficulty is that in the main the satellite countries have only agricultural goods to offer us in exchange.
When I was in Poland all that the Poles could offer us was more bacon. They asked for an increase in the bacon quota. We all know the complications of the bacon market in this country. Frankly, this is a non-starter. Roumania is another country with which we want to do more trade, but all she can send us is pulped raspberries suitable only for canteen purposes. There is a limit to the amount of pulped raspberries which we can import into this country. Obviously, we cannot extend credit from this country to these satellite countries unless there is some hope of repayment in the future. I am coming in a moment to a method in which I think trade could be greatly increased, but not along the lines which have so far been urged.
Russia itself, as the hon. Member for West Ham, North said, is anxious to purchase more from this country and is urging us all the time to purchase more of its oil. I do not pretend to be an expert on the oil industry, but, with all respect, I think that the hon. Member was a bit muddled in what he said about


it. There is a net world surplus of oil, and, obviously, Russia would like us to take some of its oil.
What would be the effects of our doing that? Leaving out of account altogether the possible effects on our strategic situation if we became dependent even in part on Russian oil, we must not forget our immense holdings in the Middle East. What would happen to our Middle East concessions if we had to decrease the amount of oil which we took from those countries and took it from Russia instead? The hon. Member knows what the answer to that would be. This is simply a non-starter, as the hon. Member himself ought to recognise.
There is another thing which Russia could sell us which she does not yet do and which would increase East-West trade. We are all very interested in finding a method of increasing trade between this country and the Soviet Union. Reference has already been made to the British Trade Fair which is to be held in Moscow next month. Tributes have been paid to the fact, to which I wish to add mine, that my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade is going there personally to open the British Exhibition. I understand, also, that he is to stay a fortnight to have trade talks with the Soviet Ministers, a fact which is also greatly to be welcomed.
Then, of course, there is to be the Soviet Trade Fair in London, from 7th to 29th July, which should do much to foster East-West trade. The British Trade Fair, I understand, is to be the biggest ever held. Over 650 firms will be exhibiting with emphasis on engineering, chemicals, electronics, electric power and structural steels. We should not forget that last year in Moscow there were exhibits of British plastics and scientific instruments.
I think that I am right—and if I am wrong my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade can correct me when he replies—in saying that already there are Board of Trade officials in Moscow doing the preliminary work and advising on negotiating new quotas within the framework of the Anglo-Soviet trade agreement before my right hon. Friend arrives. This, again, is just an earnest of our desire

to find ways of improving trade between Soviet Russia and this country.
There are four specific suggestions which I wish to make to my right hon. Friend. When I was in Poland it was represented to me, and, I think, rightly, that it was difficult to place orders for capital equipment when the quota period for imports under these bilateral trade agreements only covered one year at a time. I should like to urge the Board of Trade to consider whether these quotas could not be fixed for a minimum of at least three years in advance, so that these satellite countries could have a better idea of how much sterling they would be able to count on in the three-year period.

Mr. Douglas Houghton: Did the hon. Gentleman try to alter this when he was at the Board of Trade?

Mr. Rodgers: I did not, but I should point out, perhaps, that my duties were confined to the home side of the Board of Trade work and that it was my right hon. Friend who dealt with foreign matters.
If my right hon. Friend cannot make it three years, then perhaps at the very least he could make it two years, although I would strongly urge that we should make the period three years. If we do not, I think that the matter will be pressed by the Russians, who will urge us to make even greater concessions by way of longer credits or most favoured nation treatment. This would be ridiculous.
Secondly—and here I join forces with the hon. Member for West Ham, North—are we satisfied that the strategic list could not be further modified for the benefit of all concerned? I wonder whether my right hon. Friend has seen the suggestion made by Sir George Bolton, Chairman of the Bank of London and South Africa, in the speech which he made in February last in London to the American Chamber of Commerce, that with the advent of the Kennedy Administration the time was ripe for America to liberalise its thinking on trade with Russia and that there was a genuine feeling among friends of the United States of America that the continuance of the present policies would prove harmful to American interests in the long run.
I believe that this is true, and, therefore, I hope that the views of such an experienced person as Sir George Boston, and the views of experienced hon. Members in this House, will be given further consideration by the Board of Trade.
Thirdly, is my right hon. Friend satisfied that we could not do more to encourage the Russians and the satellite countries to try to sell to us more of those goods which are on open general licence? I know that there has been a steady increase in the import of goods in this category which is not affected by-quota restrictions. Since 1958, I believe that there has been a rise of about £30 million sterling worth of trade, mainly with Russia. Are we satisfied that we are doing all we can to encourage Russia, Poland and the other satellites to diversify their exports to us and not to rely so greatly on agricultural produce? We are continually urged to educate our manufacturers to appreciate how the State trading systems work. I wonder whether we are doing all that we could to try to educate the Russians and the satellites about the facts of our own private enterprise system.
Fourthly, I come to the question which has not so far been mentioned, that of tourism. I will not touch on the question of visas for East Germans, because I am not an expert on the subject. Tourism between the Eastern bloc and ourselves has made practically no contribution to foreign exchange earnings from invisible trade transactions between the United Kingdom and Eastern Europe. There have recently been introduced direct routes from London to Moscow, Warsaw and Prague. Could not attempts be made to step up this traffic in both directions?
In 1959, only 9,500 visitors came from the Soviet bloc. Of these, 6,200 came from Poland and only 1,400 from Russia itself. I am wondering whether my right hon. Friend could suggest to the British Travel and Holidays Association, as the Government's chosen instrument, whether it could not hold conversations with the representatives of Soviet Russia and the satellite countries to see whether this two-way traffic could not be stepped up to our mutual advantage.
Finally, I should like to make this suggestion. Of course, the biggest stimulus to increase East-West trade would occur if Russia would bring her influence to bear on substituting multilateral for bilateral trading between the two groups. The Soviet Union is loud in its protestations about wishing to raise the standard of living of its people and the satellite countries by enabling them to have more consumer goods and the like. The Russians could revolutionise the situation and assist the growth of two-way trade if they made available some of their gold supplies to the satellite countries which they now store in their own country.
If only the Russians would stop talking about exporting oil to us and talk about exporting a little gold metal, the whole situation would be changed overnight. After all, with all its faults, America has been behind the International Monetary Fund, which applies to what we call the Western countries. Why should not Russia initiate a similar movement behind the Iron Curtain and act as creditor to the other countries which come under her influence, so that they could make long-term purchases which would raise the whole level of trade between East and West? I do not understand the preoccupation of the Russians with this hoarding of their gold. It is so old-fashioned of them. If only they would add to the basis of world credit, as they easily could do and from which they are benefiting, the Russians could make a tremendous contribution not only to world prosperity, but also to world peace.
I urge hon. Members on both sides of the House who have Russian contacts to keep driving home this point to the Russians themselves. There is undoubtedly a great demand for more British goods in Russia and in the satellite countries. There are things that we would like to buy from them. A simple way of making this accounting problem soluble would be for Russia to pay in part in gold and to start some form of international bank which the satellite countries could join. I believe that this is the only immediate and long-term solution that is likely to give to East-West trade the big lift that we all so earnestly desire.

5.20 p.m.

Mr. J. J. Mendelson: I entirely agree with the last point made by the hon. Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. J. Rodgers). I disagree with some of the points that the hon. Member made, but we certainly should not lose sight of the fact that it is not only on our side that insufficient efforts are being made to increase East-West trade. The point made by the hon. Member is an important one. There are other ways in which the Soviet Government could help and could co-ordinate some of the trade between the smaller countries in Eastern Europe and ourselves.
On the other hand, I disagree with the point made earlier by the hon. Member for Sevenoaks when he said that the Soviet Union was for ever pressing the countries in Eastern Europe, including East Germany, to have more trade among themselves. That is not entirely correct. On examining the facts, particularly with his great knowledge of matters concerning trade, the hon. Member will probably find, to quote merely one example which comes to mind quickly, that eighteen months ago the people who organise trade in East Germany were much concerned to increase some of their orders in this country and in West Germany, but that, as has been rightly pointed out by the hon. Member for Down, North (Mr. Currie), to whom we are all indebted for introducing the Motion, because of political difficulties—again, caused not merely by one side, but by both sides with each other in Germany—some of those orders could not be placed.
This cannot be blamed upon the Board of Trade alone. It was a matter in which the Foreign Office was primarily involved. Nor could the orders be placed for a time in West Germany. As a result of those two difficulties, some of the foreign trade of the East German Republic was recast and more of it will now be done with countries of the Eastern bloc. That was not done, however, on the instructions of the Soviet Government as the hon. Member implied. It was done as a result of the inability to place the orders either in the United Kingdom or in West Germany, which is a completely different story.
When we approach the problem of East-West trade in a more general way,

it should be said at the outset that we must not exaggerate the possibilities of what might be achieved, even if we did a great deal more. That, however, is no reason for not making greater and stronger efforts than we are now making. It does not follow that within the next few years East-West trade can be extended to such a degree that it would replace on a considerable scale trade that we are carrying on with other countries. When we try to encourage and to urge the Board of Trade and the Foreign Office to do more in favour of East-West trade and reputable people belittle our effort by asking whether it is all that important to raise our percentage of trade with the East from 3 per cent. to, say, 5 or 7 per cent., it must be pointed out that that is a profoundly mistaken view.
We have just been presented with a Budget in which, we are told, all sorts of things must be done to encourage individuals, who, it is implied, have not been doing their fair share, to do more for our exports. I do not want to be too controversial on this occasion, or to go into detail, but it is certainly true that if it were possible to push up our exports by encouraging East-West trade to even a limited extent we should be doing far more than we are ever likely to do by giving those so-called incentives in the Budget, regardless of whether people in a certain income group are involved in the question of exports. Therefore, the fact that we are hoping for only a modest increase in our exports to these countries does not mean that it is not very much worth while.
Although the debate has concentrated mainly on trade relations with East Germany, I should like to make one or two points about other countries which are associated with the Soviet Union industrially and in trade relations and which come within the scope of the Motion. I begin with the case of China. My view is that we are not doing half enough and that the Board of Trade is to be blamed for not making larger efforts to improve trade with China. Particularly as one travels around Europe and meets some of the people who are engaged in international trade, one hears peculiar stones. I know, for example, that some Swedish importers are buying certain commodities in [his country, including a small


quantity of steel, and that Swedish exporters are exporting some of the same commodities to China. That is fantastic. All of this trade should be done directly by us.
It may be argued that we sell our products to other countries, that we do not know what they do with them and that they are perfectly free to do as they like. Of course they are. Neither I nor anybody else suggests that the Board of Trade should impose conditions of sale upon people in Scandinavia or elsewhere who import from us. What I do urge, however, is that the Board of Trade and the Foreign Office together should encourage greater efforts to secure exports by our own exporters and potential exporters, particularly some of our prosperous firms who are not particularly concerned with going into difficult markets like China because they are already doing a fairly good job; they find that the balance sheet is all right at the end of the year and they do not see why they should bother. That is where the Government have to step in.
This is not a particularly controversial question between the two sides of the House. We are all agreed that, whatever view we take about the ownership of our export industries, the Board of Trade has a job to do in encouraging people to go into different markets. My view is that when people in Scandinavia can sell some of these commodities to China, our people should have been on the job beforehand. If they have not done so, the blame must be left with the Board of Trade.

Mr. Harold Davies: I do not want my hon. Friend to be unfair to the Board of Trade, because those of us who, over the years, have watched this matter and the establishment of Chincom know that the Foreign Office has a lot of control over the Board of Trade and that often, when the Board of Trade might have liked to go ahead, the Foreign Office had the final say.

Mr. Mendelson: I am obliged to my hon. Friend. I have referred advisedly to the Foreign Office in about three instances, but I thought that as this was mainly a Board of Trade debate, it would not be right to create the impression that we were putting all the blame

upon the Foreign Office. Under our Cabinet system, the President of the Board of Trade is not a poor orphan who cannot speak up for himself. Therefore, it is quite right that on this occasion, when, I assume, a representative of the Board of Trade will reply to the debate, we should put the blame where it is due. I agree with my hon. Friend that politics comes very much into this matter, as I intend to show.
Still on the question of general trade relations, which are governed mainly by industrial considerations, I cannot understand the policy concerning our airlines. When going to East Germany, for example, one has to go by Sabena, or K.L.M., and the money has to be paid in foreign currency, which is supposed to be scarce. The result is that perfectly good trade which should accrue to our own companies is accruing to other companies which are owned abroad. This is a fantastic situation. I do not attribute the blame entirely to the Foreign Office. My view is that the whole Government are responsible for this state of affairs in letting opportunities slip. Air transport is a new industry. It is establishing itself all over Europe and all over the world.
Obviously, because of the policy that we are pursuing, many other people are getting a foothold and other airlines are being established. One cannot find a reasonable defence for such a policy. I did not know the answer on one occasion when I got out of an aircraft in East Berlin on my way to an international conference at Warsaw. In transit at East Berlin, I was asked by somebody, "Why have you not come in a British aircraft"? It was difficult to search for a reasonable answer. Many other similar examples could be quoted, but I know that other hon. Members wish to speak.
Therefore, I turn briefly to three other subjects, the first of which is the problem of bilateral trading with the countries in the Eastern bloc. There is, of course, a preference by the Eastern countries to make bilateral rather than multilateral arrangements, but we should not put too much weight on this difficulty. Although it might make matters easier if a multilateral arrangement could be made more often in certain industries for certain products, from a commercial viewpoint a good number of


commodities lend themselves readily to bilateral arrangements.
The hon. Member for Sevenoaks said that he had discussed these matters with people in Poland. At a far lower level, and as one who has not held the high position formerly occuped by the hon. Member, I, also, have discussed these matters with people in Warsaw, not long ago, and I had similar answers to those described by the hon. Member. I also heard complaints, however, about the difficulty of including credit facilities in the agreements. I heard the same view expressed in other Eastern European countries.
Obviously, it might be extremely difficult to advance hundreds of millions of pounds to a number of countries in the Eastern bloc. Sometimes, however, the sums involved are much smaller. Therefore, as a matter of Government policy, it is important to incorporate the granting of credit in agreements with these countries. There is nothing new about this. It has been traditional trade policy over the years.
The hon. Member for Sevenoaks said that it is extremely difficult to see what we might get from those countries immediately. If we pursue a trade and investment policy with a number of countries which are building up their own industries, as all these countries are doing, we shall be investing for the future and it may well be that if we buy some of the items that they are beginning to produce there might well be a better chance of repayment from these countries than if we were merely to sit back and say that we could do nothing. This is the traditional kind of trade policy which we have followed for many years.
I turn now to some of the political difficulties, without which the picture would not be complete. The picture that we sometimes see—that these matters must always be governed by strategic and political considerations—is not, I suspect, very dear to the heart of the Government. I believe that in the last five years the Government have been very much under American pressure in these matters. There is, I am certain, a great deal of evidence to prove that there has not always been complete agreement concerning the items on the strategic list and that the Government

have sometimes been rather unhappy about the extent of that list.
This is a situation in which a good deal of political courage is required. Some of the items on the strategic list are so obviously absurd and now so completely out of date that, simply by reason of recent technological developments in the Soviet Union, some of the items should be thrown out of the window and the Government should attempt strongly to reduce the list to the barest minimum. The result might well be a top secret arrangement between Government Departments, but it would eliminate most of the restrictions to the further extension of East-West trade.
I cannot, however, agree completely with the political aspect as described by some hon. Members who have spoken in the debate. The criticism of the Foreign Office as being entirely and completely unreasonable throughout the recent business of providing visas for people from East Germany is exaggerated. In fairness to the Government, it should be recalled that the whole business was started by a decision of the East German Government to prevent their own nationals in the Federal Republic from having free and unlimited access to East Berlin. The West German Government took exception to that. The reason given by the East German Government was that a number of neo-Fascist and militaristic organisations had held meetings in West Berlin. I, for one, fully understood the decision of the East German Government whilst such meetings were being held in West Berlin. My view was that the Lord Mayor and the Government of West Berlin should have prohibited any such meetings from taking place in West Berlin and that the East German Government was quite entitled to say that, whilst the meetings were being held, nobody could go across to the other half of the city.
Ten days later, however, the East German Government did something else. They passed a regulation which prevented their own fellow citizens from coming over from the other half of Germany without a permit, even when no undesirable meetings were being held in West Berlin. All the West German political parties—the Social Democrats, the sister party of the Labour Party in West Germany, agreed with the Government—


legitimately objected to such a measure. They then called upon Her Majesty's Government and the American and French Governments, as being jointly responsible for the administration of Berlin as a city under Allied control, to do something to bring home to the East German Government the necessity not to proceed in a manner which, on our side, was regarded as a violation of an international treaty in Berlin.
These facts should be stated in fairness to the British Government, although I do not believe that they took the happiest of steps in registering their objections and in the measures they took to show the East German Government that it was a matter in which they had to deal with all of us and that they should be careful about the measures they took.
The great mistake occurred, however, when the West German Government extended their counter measures to a trade boycott by breaking off trade discussions with East Germany. That was a foolish move, as was discovered twelve weeks later, when the West German Government completely revised their policy and hurriedly began new trade negotiations. What was even more absurd was that people from this country who wanted to extend East-West trade should have been involved in this absurd policy. Nobody in this country can do anything about advising the Adenauer Government when they want to mount a limited trade boycott against East Germany; that is their own affair.
But when they came to London and said to the representatives of Her Majesty's Government, "We want you to join in this. We do not want you to grant visas to people from Eastern Germany, which will prevent them from coming to London to negotiate trade", it was the job of the Foreign Office, or of the Foreign Office and the Board of Trade together if the Foreign Office did not do it on its own, to say "No" immediately and to tell the Adenauer Government that we had to make our own decisions and that no one could interfere with what we did. It is absurd to ask us, an exporting country which lives by trade, to implement a policy which will prove absurd and against our own interests in a short time.
Unfortunately, that was not the attitude taken by the Government. We therefore had this absurd policy of niggling and of keeping waiting for five weeks a man who wanted to come here to negotiate an agreement involving £1½ million until he gave up trying and never reached this country. We had the absurd policy of people being actively discouraged and told unofficially, "Because of the official policy, do not come in the next three months. Come in a year or so." In the strictly organised industrial community of Eastern Germany—it is far too strictly organised for my taste—when a person is told, "Come in a year's time", it is tantamount to his being told not to come at all, because, obviously, his superiors will instruct him to search for trade elsewhere.
While I am on the political aspect, as I have criticised the Government and urged them strongly to change their policy, I should say that I dissent from the point made by the hon. Member for Down, North concerning his interview with Herr Ulbricht. The hon. Gentleman said that Herr Ulbricht, having spoken about trade, then turned to the general problem of Germany and said that he did not hope for the reunification of East and West Germany. The onus of whether Herr Ulbricht had been correctly reported must rest on the hon. Gentleman, but, as reported this afternoon, he said that he thought that there would not be reunification for a long time, and the hon. Gentleman agreed with him. Speaking for many of my hon. Friends, I do not think that we would accept such a notion and such a policy. It is for the Germans in East and West Germany to decide whether they want to get together. I would not support a policy designed to keep them apart.
We need not get involved in all these highly inflammable subjects. We should not take sides on the question whether it is desirable to encourage the ultimate reunification of Germany. No matter what pressures there might be from Dr. Adenauer in the West or from Herr Ulbricht in the East, we ought to confine ourselves to matters of trade, the exchange of goods, the financing of agreements, and things of that kind.
I am certain that there are considerable opportunities in relations with the Soviet Union, Poland, Eastern Germany


and China. Three things are required. First, the recognition that there is an obligation on the Government, the Board of Trade and the Foreign Office together, to do much more than they have done in the last twelve years to encourage East-West trade by encouraging the granting of credit, doing certain jobs for private industry where it is not willing to do them itself and by having urgent discussions with those industries which might be potentially involved and which do not wish to initiate matters because they find it easier to supply the home market and do not want the expense and trouble of venturing into new and difficult markets.
Secondly, we should reject any pressure from other Governments, including the Federal Government, which would limit our own policy in extending trade with Eastern countries. We should tell those who say that the growth of industry in some of the Communist countries is a political threat to us that they are mistaken. I am by no means indifferent to the general desire that we all have that there should ultimately be the emergence of more liberal régimes in the Eastern countries. I am convinced that the surest way of preventing that development is to cut ourselves off in an industrial and trade sense from those countries.
I am sure that the best way to help that development is to have more and closer industrial and trading relations with them to make it possible for those working for their own country and cooperating in trade and other ways with us to say to their fellow countrymen, "We have co-operated with these Western countries. This has helped in building up our own industries. It has brought no harm".
In this way, the diehards and Stalinists on the central committees in these countries will be proved wrong when they try to hold back the development of relations between East and West. On every count, if we want to see modest advances and later greater advances in good relations between East and West politically, as well as industrially, it is in our own best interests that we should encourage and have more of these trading contacts.
Thirdly, it is very important that the Government should reintroduce the spirit of adventure in establishing new contacts even in countries in the Eastern bloc

where the prospects of huge reimports from them are not as good as they should be. The argument that a credit of one year is not enough for some of the things that we want to buy from those countries should not be a final barrier to a policy of credit extension. As we have done in the past in our relations with other overseas countries, we should take courage and grant credits. We will then find that, by helping to build up the industries of some of those countries, many of whom are very poor from the point of view of industrial development, we shall have created possibilities of importing more from them in future and we shall also have made an investment in political good will as no other way can provide, we should not always think that those countries have closed minds.
We are encouraged and instructed in our contacts with people in those countries who know that we are opposed to their political systems and critical of many of their foreign policies to see how eager and keen they are in having good relations, in particular, with representatives from this country. We should make use of this and make it the basis of a further extension of our trade relations with them.

5.48 p.m.

Mr. Cyril Osborne: As Chairman of the Anglo-Soviet Parliamentary Group in this House, I very much welcome the Motion and give it my wholehearted support. I believe that every time we trade with the East we build a bridge across which peace can be built. Where the politicians have failed to bring about understanding between East and West, the business men may well succeed. We should do our best to make it easier for business to be conducted between East and West. By so doing it will be easier to get understanding between the nations and therefore achieve the peace that we all want.
The hon. Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson) was unfair to my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, Board of Trade, in blaming the Board of Trade for not doing half enough, as the hon. Gentleman has put it, to help trade with China. On two occasions in the last eighteen months I have taken delegations of British businessmen who were intimately interested in trade with China to see my right hon. Friend. He has listened to them most courteously.


He has answered their questions and has done largely what they asked. They went away satisfied and grateful to him for what he had done. The quite unjustified blame which the hon. Gentleman laid on my hon. Friend should never have been laid on the Board of Trade or on him.
Furthermore, when I was in China last year, I visited the fair at Canton and the exhibitions at Shanghai and Pekin. I had the pleasure of being conducted round and helped by our trade commissioner and charge d'affaires. We are lucky in the good type of men that we have abroad to represent us. The hon. Gentleman does our country a great disservice by saying that the Board of Trade is not doing what it should. Obviously he does not quite know what he is talking about.

Mr. Mendelson: The hon. Gentleman will remember that I quoted a case where certain goods were being bought from this country and Scandinavia and re-exported to China. I wanted the Board of Trade to search out these opportunities. I did not say that it was not doing anything. I said that it was not doing half enough.

Mr. Osborne: It was a very unfair criticism, and I reject it utterly.
The only point on which I half agreed with the hon. Gentleman was when he said that we should not be unduly influenced by the Americans in our policy with the Eastern countries. I think that, to some extent, that is fair when we remember that 30 per cent. of our production must be exported in order that we may live, whereas the Americans have to export only 3 per cent. of their gross national product in order to live. Therefore, other things being equal, any embargo on the trade with Eastern countries hurts us ten times proportionately heavier than the Americans, and I think that from time to time that ought to be borne in mind. As many of my hon. Friends and other hon. Members wish to speak, I will cut down what I have to say to asking one or two questions.
Last week, the Russo-British Chamber of Commerce—which is doing and has for 45 years been doing a fine job on Anglo-Russian trade, and which represents 600 big firms in this country—had

its annual general meeting, at which the chairman made three points. The first was that he would welcome the growth of our trade. Our imports from Russia least year were nearly £75 million against £53 million the previous year, but this is only toying with the issue. This is only 2 per cent. of our total exports. Here is a nation of 200 million people taking only 2 per cent. of what we export. We are only scratching the surface.
What is more important is that our exports to Russia were £37 million and re-exports £16·1 million. These re-exports were largely rubber and other commodities. The balance of £21 million sterling which the Russians earned in direct trade with the United Kingdom—they sold to us nearly £75 million worth of goods and we sold to them only £53 million worth—is too large a proportion to be spent on raw material imports, which carry practically no labour content at all. I think that we ought to talk to the Russians to see whether some of that could not be used in importing consumer goods and highly manufactured goods which would provide more employment in this country. I think that is a legitimate point to make to them, and I hope that my right hon. Friend will do that for us.

Colonel Sir Tufton Beamish: That is an old point.

Mr. Osborne: It is a good point, and a good point can never be made too often. That is why I am making it now.

Sir T. Beamish: It is not new.

Mr. Osborne: I am not saying that it is new. I am saying that it is a good point, and I would rather make a good point twice than a bad one once. I leave that to hon. Gentlemen below the Gangway.
The second point—and these are all practical points—was that the trade agreement that we arranged with the Russians last year included for the first time £4 million for consumer goods. That was an enormous increase upon the previous agreement, but £4 million per annum on consumer goods for a nation of 200 million people is, as I have worked it out, about 5d. per person in Russia per year. It is ridiculous. If I may have the attention of my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, because I


am trying to make points which I want him to answer, I think we should insist on a larger proportion. Of the total trade that we did with them last year of nearly £130 million, only £4 million represented consumer goods, and it is consumer goods which we in this country manufacture so largely and which find work for so many of our people. In these circumstances, it is ridiculous that only £4 million out of £130 million of the total trade should be in consumer goods, and I should like my right hon. Friend to press for a considerably greater share for the consumer goods industries the next time an agreement is reached.
The third point that was made at the meeting last week was equally important. They are wanting more and more Russian-speaking people to help at the trade fair. I have been to Russia many times and to other countries, and I have to confess that I speak only English and I have always felt it a great disadvantage. Is the Board of Trade doing all it can to influence the Ministry of Education to see that Russian is taught as widely as possible in the schools and universities in order to meet the needs of trade?
Mr. Rodnov, the Deputy Chairman of the Russo-British Chamber of Commerce, made two complaints. First, he said that imports of oil and petroleum products into this country were entirely prohibited. Some years ago, when the present Minister of Education was President of the Board of Trade, I pressed him about extensions of licences for importing Russian oil into this country. I understand that the difficulties are that we as a nation receive about £200 million a year in royalties, to help to maintain our Welfare State, from the Anglo-American-Dutch oil concerns. We would not readily throw that £200 million a year away, but I want to put this to my right hon. Friend. The "invisible" income in the Economic Survey last year shows that the amount was down from £229 million two years ago to £22 million this year, and, in answer to a Question which I put to the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, I was told that that was largely due to the loss of our oil earnings. I put this question to my right hon. Friend. If these oil earnings are no longer coming to this country, surely, the old argument

that we could not allow a small proportion of Russian oil to come in because of those earnings is no longer valid?

Mr. Harold Davies: That is a good point.

Mr. Osborne: The other point is that oil consumption in this country is increasing by about 15 per cent. per annum. The Russians are asking that they should have 5 per cent. of that 15 per cent. increase, not touching the basic imports from the Anglo-American-Dutch group. It seems to me a reasonable request, and, as I understand it, they have suggested that if they could have that 5 per cent., they would spend the money either on machinery or consumer goods. Here is a way in which we can help, especially, the shipping industry of our country, in which there is unemployment. We should do a barter agreement with the Russians and say, "Very well, we will take that £40 million worth of oil from you as part of our normal increase in the use of oil in this country, but you will have to use the money with which to buy what we think would help us in our unemployment problem," and so on. From what I gather, I think that they are willing to do that.
Next, on the capital goods side, I understand that the Russians have been asking for seven-year credits to help some of their big purchases of heavy industrial equipment. I do not see how far that can be justified when they are earning £20 million a year in direct trade with us. I think we should first say to them that they must use that £20 million extra which they are earning from us before we grant long-term credit. I must warn my right hon. Friend that Japanese industrialists are not only providing long-term credits, but are supplying electrical equipment and ships in exchange for oil. We find that when we have dealings with the Soviet Union, we always come back to oil.
May I say to hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite that this is a point which they have to bear in mind? It not only concerns the Anglo-Dutch oil group but the National Union of Mine-workers in this country, who are saying "We do not want Russian oil in increasing quantity coming into this country to put miners out of work in Britain." That is a very good point which must


be borne in mind, and it is not an easy issue to overcome.
I would ask my night hon. Friend if the strategic list could not be abolished except for direct weapons of war. Nearly four years ago, I was lucky enough to see Mr. Khrushchev on the very day when the first sputnik went up, and he was obviously immensely proud of that achievement. Since then, the Russians have shown even further what they can do, and Mr. Khrushchev has said that this is a simple thing to do. He told me that while the strategic list no longer hurt their country industrially, it hurt their pride. He said, "Why should I come and buy from you what the Americans graciously allow you to sell to me?" That is an issue which should be looked at. It is a very important factor in their attitude to trade.
I hope to be in Moscow for the trade fair which the President of the Board of Trade is to open on the 19th of next month. The Russians are very keen on making important announcements on special occasions. This they would regard as an important occasion in Anglo-Soviet affairs. If the President of the Board of Trade has some announcements to make, either about the strategic list or oil imports to this country, will he please do so at the Soviet trade fair? He would get the maximum of good will and publicity for it if he did so.
This Motion mentions Northern Ireland especially. Northern Ireland is suffering more than any part of the country from unemployment. Its only real hope is to increase shipbuilding, for that is the main industry in Northern Ireland. In 1954 people came from the Soviet and offered to place orders in this country for a hundred ships costing about £1 million each. At the time our shipyards were so full of orders and people were so little interested that only one small yard accepted any orders. I feel confident that if the Government would do whatever lies in their power to help in this matter quite big orders for medium-sized ships could be placed in this country. One of my best industrial friends, who spends most of his life trying to further East-West trade and who is well known to my right hon. Friend, wrote in a letter to me:

On a recent visit to Poland I was staggered to find the tremendous orders now running into four years delivery which had been placed by Sudoimport with the Polish authorities. One order alone was for 56 timber-carriers of 5,000 tons each, all exactly the same.
What a godsend that would be for British shipbuilding yards. Can nothing be done to get some of these orders which we refused to accept in 1954?
I gratefully acknowledge the opportunity to support this Motion.

6.3 p.m.

Mr. Harold Davies: I am pleased to be able to follow the hon. Member for Louth (Mr. C. Osborne). Although he may not agree with me, I consider that he has made a constructive stand over the years for what I term an intelligent approach to the problem of trade. We cannot live if we have this dichotomy in the world dividing it into saints and sinners. After all, the free world has its own history or background. There have been the troubles in Malaya and the Congo and there is Cuba and Guatemala. So let us forget that, and not think that we are all white and the other side are all black.
Another thing we must remember is that this little country of ours cannot live unless we are exporting our skill and goods. The more British skill that can be put into every ounce of exports, the higher will be our earning capacity. It is the same as in the case of Switzerland, where each watch or piece of jewellery represents a high standard. For this reason we need a better technical education system. That is absolutely essential for this country. It shocks me that the Bow Group should even suggest that we should go back to the days when £1 a term had to be paid for a child's education. In a country like this, struggling to earn grub stakes, how can intelligent, dynamic young Tories even suggest that £1 a term should be paid for education when we are living in the space age and the age of technology?
A point was made by the hon. Member for Louth about invisible exports and the question of oil. Some of us who over the years have taken an interest in the old Anglo-Persian Oil Company remember the saying of Clemenceau during the First World War, "A drop of oil is worth a drop of blood." We know that the conference tables of the world have been


stained with oil. That is true of Shell and South-East Asia.

Mr. C. Osborne: Not stained, but sustained.

Mr. Davies: Today there is no reason why a constructive policy should not be adopted by which it would be possible, looking at the balance of our economy and the question of oil versus coal, to save some of our hard-earned dollar currency by having an intelligent policy over oil imports from the Soviet Union.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendelson) said, we must not pretend that East-West trade will solve all our economic problems. I have never said that; neither has anyone on either side of the House who knows what he is talking about ever said that. All we are after is a share of the market wherever we can get it. I have no interest in the sense of getting any money out of it, but I was one of the pioneers of East-West trade when I attended the Moscow Conference in 1952. We heard then all the epithets suggesting that we were Communists, but now there is an all-party committee which is trying to make a really constructive approach to the problem of buying each other's goods. Through trade we can get to understand each other in the same way as we can improve relations through sport and cultural activities.
There are, however, other parts of the world where we can get into markets besides the Soviet Union, East Germany and China. I visited the whole South-Eastern peninsula including Laos and North Vietnam, which is struggling to build up its standard of living. It needs things like bicycle tyres, machinery and consumer goods. There is some of the finest opencast coal at Haiphong. I have been round the mines there. They used to supply the whole of South-East area, but, because of the tragedy of the war, then the Indo-China War and the cold war, artificial barriers have been created, people go hungry, goods cannot move, tempers run high and propaganda flourishes.
We should release the springs of trade in that area. Then the hot water might begin to thaw the ice of the cold war. Strangely enough, the little country of Vietnam has goods to sell. When the Korean War was at its height, I with my

colleagues protested, and on one occasion voted, against the limitation of East-West trade. The United States of America insisted on our breaking off trade with China. The famous Committee, known as Chincom, was set up in Paris. There were 400 items put on the strategic list. The Soviet Union could get some goods which China could not get, and could move on.
We had these two old fuddy-duddy committees in the space age—Cocom and Chincom—preventing the intelligent development of trade. The wiseacres of the Tory Party—and sometimes of other parties—nodded their heads in an assumed sort of halo of high intelligence and said, "We have to do this to prevent the spread of Communism." Is the word "damn" a Parliamentary phrase, Mr. Deputy-Speaker? Because I want to say that they are "damn fools." This is how they have spread Communism. I know what I am talking about. I have seen this happening, and I have seen the bitterness it has created in South-East China and elsewhere.
When China wanted penicillin for her sick and diseased, the wiseacres said, "That is on the strategic list." I was in China at the time and I know that no penicillin got there from this country. But the Czechs made it and showed the Chinese how to make it, and we have lost that market. While we were acting in this way dear old Sweden was rolling in burnished ball-bearings faster than one could run round a skating rink. The Swedish ball-bearing industry captured the Chinese market while our wiseacres were saying that we could not do it because ball-bearings were on the strategic list—and also the strategic list for a nation which could make lenses, which could make transistors, which could put a sputnik into space and photograph the back of the moon.
I recall an occasion in 1952, when my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) and myself, together with an hon. Member opposite, were in a room in Moscow, and we could have secured an order for 400 steam railway engines which the Chinese wanted to buy from a British firm. We were unable to make a deal. We were unable to get into the market. Two years later I found myself rolling along by train from Pekin to Hanoi. I travelled that way on purpose in order


to see the countryside. And what did I roll along in? Hungarian rolling stock—first-class rolling stock. In order to get this statement in balance, I must add that I am not saying that at that period we could have produced at once everything that was wanted. But we could have "gotten in", as the Americans say. Since the advent of television and American films everyone uses American language, and we might as well occasionally produce a bit in the British House of Commons.
We have the reputation of having been a nation of merchant adventurers and there is no need for us to be ashamed about that. I think that the Board of Trade should help the little men who do not know how to conduct a deal on the barter system. They do not know how to deal with someone from Hungary, or East Germany or Vietnam who asks for £20,000 worth of bicycle tyres in return for 20,000 tons of coal. The little man says, "Yes, I could supply the tyres if I knew where I could sell the coal." Or it may be oil or cloves, or whatever is offered, because, like it or lump it, that will be the pattern of trade in the future. I hope that the Minister will look into this matter. I am delighted that three firms in my own constituency have had the courage to exhibit at the Moscow trade fair. I hope to get to Moscow on that occasion, and, although he is a teetotaller, I hope that the hon. Member for Louth will buy me a glass of vodka.

Mr. C. Osborne: I will buy the hon. Member two glasses.

Mr. Davies: Three firms in my constituency have had the courage to make this pioneering move and the Government should find a way to help them if they encounter a barter market. I had better end my speech now because I am becoming interested in this matter, and I could go on for a long time. Among hon. Members opposite there are enthusiastic supporters of East-West trade.
I congratulate the hon. Member for Down, North (Mr. Currie) on moving the Motion, which I hope will be accepted.

6.15 p.m.

Colonel Sir Tufton Beamish: I thoroughly enjoyed the speech of the hon. Member for Leek (Mr. Harold Davies) although I was not entirely clear about its message—

Mr. Harold Davies: The message was, "Trade, brother, trade".

Sir T. Beamish: The importance of East-West trade can be exaggerated and that is what I propose to talk about. We are all agreed on the need for more British exports. There is no doubt about that. It was the central theme of the economic White Paper. I am not sure how much more the Government can do to assist British exporters. One hears a good many suggestions, but in my opinion the Government have gone about as far as they can to create the right climate in which private enterprise can export more. I think it a mistake to do as some hon. Members have done, to keep saying that the Government must do this, that and the other. It is the British exporters who must find the markets, and provide the right after-sales service, and be competitive.
The Board of Trade is able to do a great deal to help, and I think that it has gone most of the way. However, I should like to suggest that it could go a little further in what it calls "matching" the best credit terms of our foreign competitors. Although E.C.G.D. says that it will match the best terms offered by others, very often by the time it has agreed to match them the contract has been lost. It is when the tender is being put in that exporters want to know the terms offered. We have lost many contracts, particularly in shipbuilding—which much concerns my hon. Friend the Member for Down, North (Mr. Currie)—through not being able to match the credit terms of our competitors. Had we been able to obtain evidence of those terms earlier, we might have got the contracts. That is my only serious criticism of the Government in that respect.
I think that the Motion errs slightly in implying that this House would like to see special measures taken to encourage exporters to what my hon. Friend calls
countries of the Planned Economy Group.
I do not see why any special measures should be taken to encourage exporters to those countries. I like to see exports going to those countries, but I do not see why exporters to Hungary or to East Germany should receive greater encouragement from the Board of Trade than exporters to Chile or to Timbuktu. To that extent I do not agree with the terms


of the Motion although I should add that in moving it my hon. Friend did not ask for special terms.
As I have said, although I am in favour of East-West trade, which has positive advantages from many aspects, I think that its importance can be greatly exaggerated. The markets are not big and we have unfavourable balances with nearly all the Communist countries. It is all very well for my hon. Friend the Member for Louth (Mr. C. Osborne) to talk about buying Soviet oil. I am not sure whether my hon. Friend talked about 5 per cent. of 15 per cent., or about 5 per cent. of the total British imports—

Mr. Osborne: Five per cent. of the 15 per cent. is the only increase for which the Soviets are asking.

Sir T. Beamish: I am grateful to my hon. Friend. That is about 1 per cent. of the total British imports which my hon. Friend tells me means another £40 million, or something like that.
It is very easy to say that we want the Soviet Union to buy our consumer goods. We have been asking the Soviet Union to do that year in and year out, but they will not buy, and that is the trouble. It is all very well to talk about barter agreements. They make promises and say that they want a terrific amount of consumer goods, but when the time comes they do not buy them. That is what we are up against.
The House must realise that for the Communist countries exporting is a luxury. It is clear that the Soviet Union and the Communist bloc aim at being completely autonomous. They do not have to export one nut or bolt to live. For all practical purposes they are self-sufficient. That is one of our difficulties, and one of the reasons why exports from the Soviet Union, and from some of the occupied countries of Europe, and from China, have an important political content.
For the Communist countries trade is politics. To us trade means largely that we have to trade to live. We believe that by the freer flow of trade we will get to know people better and improve our economy. We believe in trade for its own sake, and as a means of raising standards of living throughout the world. I do not believe that any of those things animate the Communist countries

when they are exporting. To them exporting is not a necessity and it has an important political content which is one of the reasons why they are so selective in the countries to which they send their exports and their aid.
I have been into this very thoroughly and I have some knowledge on the subject. There are solid grounds for more than a suspicion that the Soviet Union is more interested in buying "know-how" than in regular trade. That is why it so often buys expensive, technically complicated complete plants, and that is why transactions of that kind are so often apt to be once-and-for-all transactions. There is no reason why we should not provide them with that type of plant if we can do it competitively, but we should realise that in many cases there is unlikely to be a follow-up or a regular flow of trade in plant of that kind.
We should also remember that for political reasons the Soviet Union sometimes cuts off trade completely. The House obviously remembers the Petrov trial in Australia: as that trial advanced it was clear that Petrov was going to be exposed. At that time the Soviet Union was buying Australian wool. For political reasons the Soviet Union cut off dead its trade agreement with Australia and refused to buy another inch of wool from that country. That is another risk which must be borne in mind.
Ask Marshal Tito what he thinks about being cut off with a knife the moment one falls out politically with the Soviet Union. Yugoslavia was practically starved as a result of the economic blockade and the ending of the trade agreement with Russia when Marshal Tito fell out with Marshal Stalin. The standards of living in Yugoslavia fell desperately, and now Yugoslavia is trading on a large scale with the West although I hear that it has signed, or is about to sign, a substantial trade agreement with the Soviet Union. That again must be borne in mind. It shows that there are disadvantages as well as advantages in East-West trade.
There are particular disadvantages for countries whose economies rest on one product. For example, the Egyptians could tell us a good deal about what happened to the Egyptian cotton which the Soviet Union was buying. I was in


Germany a month ago, and I was told by a leading politician in the equivalent of the Board of Trade in the Bonn Government that Egyptian cotton was being sold not long ago in Eastern Germany and Czechoslovakia at about half the normal world price. It was being sold inside the Soviet bloc at prices which heavily undercut those of the Egyptian Government itself. The Egyptian Government were extremely angry about this, but it is the kind of risk which people run when they allow their economies to get into the hands of a country which looks on trade as politics.
I hear that Ghana may be having difficulty in selling her cocoa crop. She would be well advised to look extremely carefully at any barter arrangements which may be suggested by the Soviet Union, bearing in mind the Egyptian experience with cotton.
That raises in my mind a rather important point from the point of view of the British Government. When it became clear to the United States Government that the Castro régime was moving to the Left and that well-known Communists in Cuba were gaining influence in that country, and when American industry was sequestrated without compensation, they decided that they would not continue to buy a large part of the Cuban sugar crop. Within less than twenty-four hours it was announced in Moscow that the Russians would buy the sugar, and that the major deficiency in Cuba, which was oil, would be met by the Soviet Government whose tankers were already at sea. The Russians acted like lightning.
How quickly did we act after the Posnan riots in Poland in 1956 when it became clear that Poland had a chance of loosening the Soviet economic grip on her country? There were months of negotiations throughout the free world, resulting in the end in a rather unsatisfactory American loan agreement which did not go more than halfway to do what the Poles hoped for and thought was reasonable. The response from the United States and from the British Government was very disappointing, thereby showing that we have not realised that in the world struggle which is going on trade is politics and that sometimes one

has to move quickly for political reasons.
I have two more points to make. First, another possible disadvantage of trading with some of the Communist countries is that they are likely sometimes to try dumping their products in this country. If one were to go into the markets and shops one could buy large Polish eggs of good quality for half the price at which they are being sold in Poland. The quantity of Polish eggs coming into this country is about five or six times what it was during the corresponding months last year, and they are being sold at absurdly low prices. I have the figures, but I will not weary the House with them. The quantity coming in is about six times higher than it was, and the price is so absurd that there must be a major element of subsidy in it. Rumanian eggs too are being sold at similar prices, though in smaller quantities.
If I had time I would give the House details, because I have been checking on the prices and qualities of Polish eggs. According to the newspapers the three Farmers' Unions and the British Egg Marketing Board have submitted an anti-dumping application to the Board of Trade in respect of these eggs. I need not, therefore, go into further details, but this stresses another risk in trading with Communist countries, that when it suits their purpose they are likely to dump their products in this country.
My last point is a rather serious one. I hope that the House will acquit me of trying to lecture it in some way; that is something which I hope I shall never do. When business men, particularly business men who are politicians, go behind the Iron Curtain for business or commercial reasons, they must be extremely careful about what they say and do, so that what they say and do cannot be used by régimes, which are only kept in power behind the Iron Curtain by Moscow, to try to make themselves, that is the régimes, look respectable, which they are not. When I was in Germany I spoke to the Mayor of Berlin and to leading members of the Bonn Government about this. I was told that several people from this country—I have no wish to name them; they are not hon. Members of this House anyhow—


recently made remarks in Eastern Germany which caused the utmost offence in Western Germany, and quite understandably too.
People out there for business reasons, who had political connections, said that they did not believe in German reunification, that Eastern Germany should be recognised immediately, and admitted to the United Nations, that the Oder-Neisse line should be recognised immediately, and that the Nazi movement started in Munish and not in Dresden or Leipzig. They made remarks of that kind; some of them, perhaps, tenable from certain points of view; but one could not resist the suspicion that some of those remarks were made by people concerned to ingratiate themselves with the régimes in order to try to get more business. One can understand the annoyance of the West German Government.
This is especially important in the present delicate state of our diplomatic relations with those parts of the world. Everybody who goes behind the Iron Curtain should remember to be very careful indeed not to say or to do anything which can be used by the Communist régimes and others to damage the free world's interests.
As I promised to sit down by half-past six, I conclude simply by saying that I am not in any way opposed to a greater flow of East-West trade, but there are a good many disadvantages to this trade which often are not sufficiently well recognised.

6.31 p.m.

The Minister of State, Board of Trade (Mr. F. J. Erroll): I am glad that, thanks to the Motion moved by my hon. Friend the Member for Down, North (Mr. Currie), the House has been provided with an opportunity today of discussing the very important subject of East-West trade. The Motion urges the Government
to give every encouragement to those firms who endeavour to increase their exports to the countries of the Planned Economy group…
The House may like to know that the Government will gladly accept this Motion if it is agreed to by the House. I should like to spend my time in making a contribution to what has been a most interesting and instructive debate and in saying something about our general trade policy. I should also like to try to answer

some of the very interesting detailed points which have been put forward.
I should like to say to my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Mr. J. Rodgers) that I very much appreciate his remarks about the Board of Trade and about our policy generally. It is the Government's policy to encourage expansion of trade in both directions to the highest possible level, but that is subject to three main considerations. First of all, we must avoid excessive dependence on the Sino-Soviet bloc countries for particular products. I think that that was well brought out by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes (Sir T. Beamish) in his very striking and interesting speech. Secondly, we must not allow trade—and here we have in mind particularly imports from the bloc countries into Britain—to lead to the disruption of British industries or of markets in the United Kingdom. My hon. Friend the Member for Down, North referred in passing to linen, which is a very important Northern Ireland industry. He knows as well as I do how sensitive that industry is to any large-scale imports of linen goods from the bloc countries. My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes also referred to eggs, about which I may have time to say a word later.
Thirdly, we obviously have to avoid exports of particular types of equipment which are of strategic importance to us and our allies. I may refer to that subject, too, later.
I should like to tell the House how we apply that policy in practice. It is important that we should all understand and agree with this policy because it does determine the way in which our trade exchanges are conducted and, indeed, expanded.
On the import side, most raw materials and basic foodstuffs are admitted freely from all the bloc countries. Imports of manufactured goods, however, and agricultural commodities most likely to cause difficulties in the United Kingdom market are limited by quotas.
The proportion of total imports which is unrestricted in the case of any bloc country depends on what each of them has to offer and upon what amount of quota goods we are prepared to take. In 1960, the proportion of unrestricted goods varied from 95 per cent. in the case of the Soviet Union, whose exports to us


are traditionally of raw materials and grain, to only 20 per cent. in the case of Hungary, whose exports to us are mainly manufactured goods and foodstuffs. That may help my hon. Friend the Member for Down, North to understand why the trade figures with Hungary are, in his view, rather disappointing.
In the field of restricted imports, we negotiate quotas annually. This is usually within the framework of three- or five-year trade arrangements with each country. We use the import quotas which we grant to secure in return an entry for as wide a range as possible of United Kingdom exports to the bloc countries. This is a particularly important feature of our trade arrangements, because we use our import quotas as a means of securing more openings for our exports and thus expanding our export trade.
I should just mention in passing that China is the exception to this. We have no trade arrangement with China covering imports of quota goods, and we have, therefore, to decide ourselves what these quotas should be.
Exports to the bloc countries are very much in our minds particularly in the Board of Trade, and in our negotiations we aim to get the maximum opportunities for our exports. A number of factors affect the final result. We have to assess what industries in Britain are likely to be able to sell or to want to sell. We want the quotas which we obtain, often after much hard bargaining, to be as fully used as possible by British exporters.
I mentioned that we have annual negotiations. Before the annual negotiations start we consult established trade organisations both directly and through a special body called the Consultative Committee for Industry. In the Board of Trade we aim at informing ourselves fully in advance of the export contributions which British industries can and are willing to make. Then armed with this information we make our requests at the start of the negotiations for quotas for our exports. This is an essential part of the process in order to get openings for our exports.

Mr. Houghton: Can the right hon. Gentleman give any instances where they have not been fully taken up?

Mr. Erroll: Yes, there are instances in both directions in the degree of quota

fulfilment, to use the jargon we have in the Board of Trade. These are always discussed in negotiations, because obviously we want to make the quotas as realistic as possible.
We have to recognise, on the other side, the willingness or otherwise of the bloc countries to buy particular classes of goods from abroad, and we have to recognise that their present needs are chiefly for raw materials and capital goods and that it may not always be possible to persuade them to open their markets as much as we should like to products, often consumer goods, to which they attach a much lower priority. Of course, we should like to sell more consumer goods to the bloc countries if only they would buy them, particularly to the Soviet Union. That is why we have a separate heading in the trade agreement with Russia for consumer goods. We are finding it very difficult to raise the figure to as much as we should like, and this is because the Russians will only buy consumer goods from us with the proceeds of consumer goods which they have previously sold to us. So that makes it a very slow business. They buy consumer goods from us only in proportion to what we have already bought from them.
I think that I must make particular reference to a detail of the Motion, although it was hardly touched on during the debate, because it rather suggests that we should make quota arrangements for Northern Ireland industries in particular. The House will appreciate from what I have already said about the procedure that it would not be possible—nor, indeed, would it be desirable—for export quotas to be limited to the products of any particular region of the United Kingdom such as Northern Ireland, or Scotland or Wales for that matter. I am sure that the bloc countries would never accept such a restriction upon their freedom to buy from the United Kingdom. However, I should like to say, to reassure my hon. Friend, that in our negotiations on quotas for exports we keep very much in mind the goods which are produced in Northern Ireland. The industries of Northern Ireland are well represented for the most part on the trade associations we consult, and we also keep in close touch with the Ministry of Commerce in Belfast.
Shipbuilding was mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Down, North and one or two other hon. Members. The plain fact of the matter is that the bloc countries have not shown very much interest in buying ships from us, although, apart from two very specialised classes, they can now be exported without restriction.
We must recognise a number of other factors in these negotiations, such as the overall trading position of the bloc countries.
In general, we import more from them than we export to them. The situation differs from country to country, but we do not try in our negotiations to balance precisely the United Kingdom's visible trade with each country. We believe that the growth of trade is best promoted by the present arrangements, in which the sterling earnings of the various members of the bloc are freely convertible and, although the bloc countries are free to use their sterling earnings in any part of the world, the surpluses earned by some of them in their trade with the United Kingdom are used for expenditure on invisibles, repayment of debts owed to us and purchases of commodities from the rest of the sterling area, largely in the form of raw materials or foodstuffs. The sterling area is a net gainer of gold and convertible currencies from trade with these countries.
My hon. Friend the Member for Seven-oaks, referred to Russian gold. Russia sells gold regularly. We do not know the total of Soviet gold production, but we have no reason to believe that they are adding to their gold stocks. They probably export their current gold production to pay for the excess of their imports over their exports on a world wide basis.
Having negotiated the trade arrangements, the Board of Trade does not sit back and leave all the rest that has to be done to the businessmen. We have our commercial officers in the countries concerned and they are very active. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Louth (Mr. C. Osborne) for referring to the work done by our Commercial Counsellor in Peking, and our other overseas officers. When an exporter goes abroad these officers endeavour to help them in every way, including assisting

them in making contacts with trading organisations and individuals.
The Board of Trade's Export Services Branch in London and Board of Trade regional offices provide useful and up-to-date information of individual trading opportunities.
As to the results, I consider that our policy has been successful. The total volume of trade has increased remarkably during the last three years. I can give the House one or two figures which may be of interest, particularly in response to questions asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks. Our imports from the Sino-Soviet bloc have increased from £121 million in 1958 to £164 million in 1960. On the other side, our exports and re-exports rose from £103 million to £129 million in that period. This represents an increase in exports of 25 per cent., and compares with a figure of 11½ per cent. for the increase in our exports to the rest of the world in the same period. Our policy has thus been successful, is successful and, I suggest, is the right one to continue to pursue.
There has been a great deal of discussion this afternoon about Eastern Germany. This is a big subject and one which could occupy the whole of my time, so I shall deal briefly with the points raised by the mover of the Motion and by the hon. Gentleman and Member for Penistone (Mr. Mendel-son) who referred to B.E.A. services, or the lack of them, into Eastern Germany. This question was dealt with at Question Time, on 13th March and again on 20th March. The Minister of Aviation, in reply to a Question, said:
There is no such prohibition as far as Her Majesty's Government is concerned."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 13th March, 1961; Vol. 636, c.599.]
A week later, my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal was asked a Question about the West German Government and, in reply, he said:
The Government of the Federal Republic of Germany have placed no restriction on the provision by British European Airways of flights to the Leipzig Fair."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 20th March. 1961; Vol. 637, c.21.]

Dame Irene Ward: As that reply referred to a Question asked by me after my return from Leipzig, would my right hon. Friend explain exactly what is the position and why the difficulty arose?

Mr. Erroll: There always are difficulties for an airline in negotiating new routes to any part of the world, and it is for them to get on with their negotiations. My hon. Friend will be aware that the point I am making is that no restriction was placed by either the British Government or the West German Government in this matter.

Mr. Mendelson: If that is the position—and I do not dissent so far as the legal position of prohibition is concerned—is it not possible for the right hon. Gentleman to go further and to give an assurance that Her Majesty's Government will encourage that extension of routes? The right hon. Gentleman is not without influence on the airlines.

Mr. Erroll: The fact that we place no restriction in the way should be sufficient to make clear our attitude in the matter. It would be wrong to start pushing the nationalised airlines about and saying that they should have services here or there. That is a temptation I have resisted in my desire to see trade extended with other countries. It is surely best to leave it to the nationalised airlines to make their own assessments of the proper commercial opportunities.
On the question of offices, there is a trade information office of the East German authorities established in London called K.F.A. Ltd., and full information about East German trading opportunities can be obtained from that office. The mover of the Motion claimed that the East Germans had fulfilled their quotas, while we had not. My information does not agree with that of my hon. Friend because, according to my figures, for 1960 our export quotas were fulfilled as to 57 per cent. and our import quotas were fulfilled as to 58 per cent.
The hon. Gentleman the Member for West Ham, North (Mr. A. Lewis) and the hon. Gentleman the Member for Penistone referred to the restriction on visitors from East Germany. This is not primarily a trading matter and I would refer this subject to my hon. and right hon. Friends at the Foreign Office. It is possible to do business through the post and it is not essential always to visit Britain, although I realise that travel restrictions are a hindrance. However, restrictions have now been removed and trade should be able to continue without hindrance.
A steel works order was referred to by the hon. Member for West Ham, North. This order was supposed to have been lost, but has, in fact, not been placed. What actually happened was that an order was placed for some other steel works equipment. This order was of a much smaller size and was confused with the larger project. We shall consider any application for cover for the £40–£50 million order on its merits and in the light of the financial position of the East Germans, so far as this can be established.
On the other side of the world, our trade with China is going up satisfactorily. This matter was referred to by the hon. Member for Penistone, by my hon. Friend the Member for Louth, and by other hon. Gentlemen. In 1959 our exports to that country were running at £24·4 million and in 1960 they had increased to £31·4 million—a substantial increase. At the same time, imports from China in 1959 were £19·7 million, and in 1960 they were £24·9 million.
My hon. Friend the Member for Louth made some kind references to my meetings with groups of business men who came to discuss Sino-British trade, and in this connection I would remind the House of the existence of the Sino-British Trade Council which exists for the specific purpose of promoting Sino-British trade. There are other bodies which make a special feature of promoting trade with the bloc countries, including the Russo-British Chamber of Commerce, the Association of British Chambers of Commerce and the Federation of British Industries, which is particularly helpful.
There is also an organisation called the British Council for the Promotion of International Trade, and Her Majesty's Government are often asked about their views on the activities of this Council. I have therefore consulted my right hon. Friend the Lord Privy Seal and, with his agreement, I can confirm that there has been no change in the attitude of Her Majesty's Government towards it. This is an organisation of Communist origin formed as a result of the Moscow International Economic Conference, itself initiated by the World Peace Council, one of the principal agencies of international Communism.
As Sir Anthony Eden said in the House on 8th November, 1953, it is public knowledge that members of the Council have been either members of the Communist Party or closely associated with bodies which are generally recognised to be Communist "front" organisations.
Although the B.C.P.I.T. claims to act in the interests of promoting trade between Great Britain and all other countries, in practice the Council is solely concerned with Communist bloc countries, and its publications and activities show that it has a strong bias in favour of Communist international economic policy.
The decision to use the services of any particular organisation must be left, of course, to the judgment of each firm or individual, but traders will no doubt wish to consider carefully whether they should arrange their business through an organisation which has political tendencies when there are alternative independent and non-political organisations or channels available to them.
Another important subject to which reference has been made in the debate is the matter of strategic controls. I know that there are some who would say that they are a lot of hocum-cocom, but I can assure the House that these controls are still necessary. It is true that they stop the sale of certain commodities which may have a military use, but I do not agree that they are a significant factor in our total trade with Communist bloc countries. When the China list was brought into line with the Soviet bloc list, it did not lead to a great upsurge in trade with China in items which had been previously banned.
Controls are operated in agreement with our allies and are being constantly reviewed to keep the list of controlled items up to date and as short as possible. The number of goods affected has been very considerably reduced during the last two or three years. At present the controls prohibit only a very limited range of goods apart from actual munitions of war and atomic energy materials, and surely we are right to keep those goods under control. The countries of Eastern Europe keep a very strict control over their exports to the West. Although they do not publish their own list of strategic goods, as we do, we certainly know that they would not supply

to us munitions or other goods which have a military use.

Mr. Douglas Jay: Although there may be a case for some sort of list, surely we can remove from the list equipment which we know exists in Soviet bloc countries or which is manufactured by them.

Mr. Erroll: That is a matter which we discuss with our allies and we move in agreement with them. Although those countries may have some of this equipment they may still want ours. Although they may make or have one unit, that does not mean that they do not want more.
The hon. Member for West Ham, North who raised the question of oil supplies was very ably answered by my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks. My hon. Friend the Member for Louth also referred to the subject. Our exports to Russia, of course, could be increased considerably if we agreed to take several million tons of Russian oil and thus enable the Soviet authorities to earn the money necessary to pay for British equipment. I am bound to say that this presents very great difficulty for us. As a country in which two of the major oil companies are located, we are in effect oil producers and we have to face the fact that there is a world surplus of oil at present. Most of our crude oil comes from the under-developed countries of the Middle East who are also important customers for our exports. It is not a matter of "invisibles" as my hon. Friend the Member for Louth seemed to suggest. He should remember that these countries are already an important market for our exports. It would certainly not help them if we were to reduce our takings of oil from them. They would have to reduce their purchases from us and so our exports would not benefit overall.

Mr. C. Osborne: What the Soviet authorities are asking is not that we should reduce our imports from the Middle East but that they should have a small share of the annual increase that we are taking.

Mr. Erroll: I appreciate that point, but in view of the real need for the Middle Eastern and other countries to develop as fast as they possibly can and the great investment that has taken place of their technicians and their labour as


well as our resources, I think that it would be wise to remember their considerable interests.
In the few minutes left to me I must come to the final point underlying the Motion which is before the House. It is the question whether our trade with the bloc countries can be increased in the years to come. We believe that there is scope for a measured but not a dramatic increase. We hope, for instance, to be able to give added impetus to this trade by increasing the quotas for the import of goods from these countries whenever this can be wisely done without exposing our markets to risks of disruption. I should like to remind the House of what was said by my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Lewes about eggs, which is quite a serious matter for British egg producers at present. It would make life much easier for us at the Board of Trade if we could bring in all the bloc eggs and thus assist our exports, but we have to remember the position of the domestic producers for the home market.
In all recently concluded negotiations it has been possible to raise the targets of trade in 1961 by modest amounts. But I do not think that we can discuss future plans in detail because under the system which I have already described, whereby we have these annual negotiations it will be clear that it would prejudice our success in forthcoming negotiations if I gave away our hand in advance. In these negotiations we always aim to achieve the maximum level for our exports under the policy which I have described. We shall continue to help United Kingdom exporters by means of all the facilities of the Board of Trade and our commercial offices abroad and through the credit insurance facilities of the E.C.G.D., which are available to our exporters to bloc countries under conditions which are roughly similar to those for exporters to other countries.
The countries of the Sino-Soviet bloc can also do a lot by earning more sterling with which to pay for their purchases. They can do this by developing their exports to us of goods which we freely admit under open licence. They can increase their earnings by filling more completely the many quotas for their imports which they now use only in part

or not at all. They can also help by diversifying the type of goods which they hope to sell in this country and so reduce the risk of disrupting our domestic markets, and incidentally helping to improve conditions for a two-way growth of trade.
Hon. Members have been kind enough to refer to the forthcoming visit of my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade to Moscow to open the great British Fair there. I know that he will appreciate those kind remarks. He will also be having discussions with the Government of the U.S.S.R. and incidentally will be going to Poland for a day or two where he will also have discussions. He will hope, with those discussions in mind, to create conditions for a further expansion of trade and I hope that he will bear in mind the suggestion made by my hon. Friend the Member for Louth.
Her Majesty's Government will certainly continue to seek every opportunity to urge the bloc countries to co-operate so that the trade of the United Kingdom as a whole with the Sino-Soviet bloc countries can be expanded to the highest possible level.
As to long-term quotas or trade arrangements, which have been suggested by several hon. Members as being a means of increasing our trade, we feel that we must reserve the position which we have adopted of negotiating annual quotas for the import of goods in the controlled sphere. Some of these imports fluctuate violently according to crop seasons, and rigid quotas for a long period ahead might lead to considerable difficulties. I assure the House that we shall carefully study all the points raised in the debate and will continue unabated our work in this important field of Britain's trade relations with the rest of the world.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That this House, being conscious of the necessity for expansion of the exports of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to countries overseas, urges Her Majesty's Government to give every encouragement to those firms who endeavour to increase their exports to the countries of the Planned Economy Group, and asks Her Majesty's Government when negotiating trade agreements with these countries to have particular regard to the contributions that can be made by the Northern Ireland shipbuilding, heavy engineering, textile and electrical industries.

Orders of the Day — REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA (TEMPORARY PROVISIONS) BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

7.1 p.m.

The Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations (Mr. Duncan Sandys): I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
Before dealing with the Bill, I should like to ask the indulgence of the House. Some time ago—before Parliamentary business was fixed—it was arranged that I should lead the British delegation to the Sierra Leone independence celebrations which are starting tomorrow. In consequence, I have to be in my aeroplane in about a couple of hours' time, so I hope very much that the House will excuse my absence during the later stages of the debate.
On 31st May, two things of importance will happen; the Union of South Africa will become a Republic, and she will cease to be a member of the Commonwealth. The first will be effected by an Act of the South African Parliament; the second is the result of the decision of the Union Government, and requires no legislation. Both these changes are outside the jurisdiction of the United Kingdom, and they are not dependent upon legislation in this House. On the other hand, they will have repercussions of various kinds on the application of numerous laws of the United Kingdom and of British Colonies.
Last month, we had a full debate on the circumstances that led to the withdrawal of South Africa from the Commonwealth and I do not, therefore, propose this evening to discuss those wider issues. I shall confine my remarks to the Bill that is now before the House, and explain why it is needed and what its effect will be.
Legislation of some kind would, of course, have been necessary in any case in consequence of the transition of South Africa from a monarchy within Her Majesty's Dominions to a Republic which no longer owes allegiance to the Crown. We have had a similar constitutional changes in India, Pakistan and Ghana, and there are now well-established precedents for regularising

the position, but the withdrawal of South Africa from the Commonwealth has faced us with a number of new issues which call for the most careful consideration. All that, as the House will appreciate, will inevitably take a little time.
The need for this Bill arises from the fact that unless we take legislative action, a considerable number of existing United Kingdom and colonial laws will cease to have effect in relation to South Africa after 31st May. The reason is that these laws are worded in such a way that they apply only to countries which form part of Her Majesty's Dominions or—in other cases—to members of the Commonwealth. These laws are concerned with a whole lot of miscellaneous matters and effect a wide variety of interests, and the House may like to have some examples of these laws.
Among others, there is the Merchant Shipping Act of 1894, which, amongst other things, governs the issue of competency certificates to masters, mates or engineers on board ship. At present, certificates issued in South Africa are interchangeable with those issued in the United Kingdom. Under this Act, no ship can be called British unless it is wholly owned by British subjects or by companies established under the law of a part of Her Majesty's Dominions. Therefore, a ship owned by a company incorporated in South Africa would lose its status as a British ship on 31st May unless legislative action was taken to prevent it.
Then there is the Colonial Probates Act, 1892. This provides for the recognition in the United Kingdom of probate and letters of administration granted in South Africa. We need to consider very carefully what changes, if any should be made. The plain withdrawal of recognition would clearly create many complications and hardships. Another of the laws affected is the Maintenance Orders (Facilities for Enforcement) Act, 1920, which at present enables maintenance orders made in South Africa to be enforced here, and vice versa.
Then there are laws such as the Medical Act, 1956, and the Dentists Act, 1957, which make distinctions between professional qualifications obtained in Commonwealth countries and those obtained in


foreign countries. Similarly, the Solicitors Act, 1957, confers advantages on South African solicitors who wish to be admitted in England. There are many other Acts which will be similarly affected, such as the Evidence by Commission Act, 1859, the Colonial Marriages Act, 1865, the Naval Prize (Procedure) Act, 1916, the Companies Act, 1948—and even the Finance Act of last year. The House, will, I am sure, not wish me to go into all these, but I think that the examples I have quoted will give hon. Members a good idea of the kind of problems that will arise on 31st May, and which we need time to consider.
Some of the issues of policy involved are reasonably straightforward; others are purely legal, and should not be too difficult to resolve. But there are yet others which present quite difficult human and political problems which will, I think, require a good deal of careful thought. These matters will not only need to be studied here in London, but will have to be fully discussed with the Government of the Union. Colonial Governments will also be affected, and will need to be consulted.
I hope that I have said enough to convince the House that it will be quite impossible to settle all these questions between now and 31st May. A standstill arrangement is clearly necessary to hold things as they are while study and discussion are going on, and that is the sole purpose of the Bill. The Bill's effect is to ensure that all Acts that would otherwise cease to apply to South Africa will continue to apply to her for a period of not more than one year after 31st May. I understand that a similar standstill Measure will shortly be presented to the South African Parliament.
This does not, of course, imply that we necessarily mean to let things run on for a whole year—that is the maximum period. I shall be surprised if we are not able to sort things out a good deal more quickly than that, but I think that the House will realise that to allow for the possibility of unforeseen difficulties, or congestion in our Parliamentary programme, it is, perhaps, wise to specify a period of twelve months.
I have given the House some examples of the miscellaneous assortment of laws

that will be retained in force in relation to South Africa by this Bill. As the House will see, these do not include some of the more important aspects of our relationship with South Africa. The reason is that either these are not based upon legislation, or that the legislation on which they are based was not worded in such a way that it will be automatically affected by South Africa's constitutional change. For example, South Africa's participation in the sterling area is not affected by her becoming a Republic or by her withdrawal from the Commonwealth. We welcome Dr. Verwoerd's statement that the Union wishes this relationship to continue unaltered.
Similarly, South Africa's constitutional change has no legal effect upon bilateral agreements between us, as, for example, our agreements on trade and defence, although all these arrangements will naturally 'have to be reviewed. Nor will South Africa's altered status affect the international relationship between the High Commission Territories and the Union. We shall continue to be responsible for the High Commission Territories as at present, and the pledges that we have given, of course, stand unaltered.
At Question Time last week, I was asked whether the seat of administration of Bechuanaland would continue to be situated across the border, at Mafeking. I am not yet in a position to make any statement on this point. I was also asked whether the representative of the British Government in the Union would continue to be responsible for the Government of the territories, and this, again, is one of the questions which we are at present considering.
It is, of course, not a matter which will require legislation, but I assure the House that I shall make a separate statement on this matter as soon as a decision is reached. Until then the existing arrangement will continue, though in his diplomatic capacity the British representative in South Africa will, from 31st May, have the title and status of ambassador. I am not saying in advance what decision may be reached, but he will, for the time being, at any rate, have a dual status, that is to say, the status of ambassador in his diplomatic capacity, and High Commissioner in his capacity as Governor of the territories.

Mr. John Dugdale: Does that mean that the decision is not likely to be reached until after 31st May?

Mr. Sandys: It means that no decision has been reached today. I cannot say exactly what decision will be reached on this matter. All these matters are, to a large extent, linked with one another, and although one may have a fairly good idea what the decison will be, it may be wise to wait until we have reviewed the whole field—I am talking about the High Commission Territories—before announcing piecemeal decisions.
There is also one important matter which, al though it is governed by Statute, does not require to be brought within the scope of the Bill. That is the important question of nationality and citizenship. This is defined by the British Nationality Acts, 1948 and 1958. These Acts confer upon South African citizens the status of British subjects. It is not, of course, our intention to leave unaltered the rights in respect of British nationality now enjoyed by South African citizens. But this is a matter which requires most careful thought and on which it would be wrong to try to reach hurried conclusions.
The permanent legislation which we shall introduce before the end of the standstill period will embrace not only amendments to the laws covered by this Bill, but also other matters which require legislative action. Changes of an administrative kind, in particular those relating to the High Commission Territories, will, as I have just said, be announced as and when decisions are reached. As I said in our recent debate:
We must be careful not to destroy the value of Commonwealth membership by giving to those who are not members all the privileges of those who are."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 22nd March, 1961; Vol. 637, c.527.]
We have no thought of doing that.
At the same time, we have had an intimate and many-sided association with South Africa for more than a century. Our affairs have become closely interwoven in numerous ways, and we have developed between one another valuable connections in trade and other spheres. The relationships between Britain and South Africa will, of course, not be the same as they were before, but I should like to emphasise that we have no desire needlessly to destroy links which are of mutual benefit to both our peoples.

7.16 p.m.

Mr. H. A. Marquand: We, of course, readily grant to the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State the indulgence for which he asked on going to Sierra Leone. I am not sure whether he has been there before, but I have, and I know that he will enjoy the experience. We wish him well, and, once more, let me say how much we wish Sierra Leone a very happy future as an independent country.
The right hon. Gentleman has told us today that we must consider not the cause of South Africa leaving the Commonwealth, but the consequences. Unfortunately, although he gave us a long list of legislation which will at some time become necessary, he did not go very deeply into the consequences. We on this side of the House feel that this is an opportunity to consider the principles that should guide us in this new relationship with the Union of South Africa, and perhaps it will be helpful to the right hon. Gentleman—I hope that it will—when he is working out all the large number of decisions to which he has referred, and when he is drafting the large number of Statutes which may be necessary, to know what is in the mind of the House of Commons about the way in which this relationship should in future be carried on.
I myself think that two principles should guide us. The first, surely, should be that the actions which we take in formulating the new relationship with the Union of South Africa do not in any way appear to condone apartheid. The Prime Minister referred in the debate on 22nd March to a
…tragically misguided and perverse philosophy which lies at the root of apartheid;…"—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 22nd March, 1961; Vol. 637, c.449.]
Since then the United Kingdom has voted, we are very glad to know, in the United Nations for a Resolution condemning apartheid and requesting all States "to consider taking such separate or collective action as is open to them in conformity with the United Nations Charter to bring about the abandonment of such policies." We are committed to taking collective action to ensure this.
Our relationship with South Africa is now, or will be very soon, that which applies to foreign countries. Surely, our


sheet anchor of policy in determining our relationship with South Africa in future, as with every foreign country, should be the maintenance of the United Nations and its authority. If this is right in the Congo, it must be right in South Africa. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] I said that deliberately, because I think that it will be very interesting to see what hon. Members opposite think about this.
In particular, we should take note immediately, and bear it very much in mind in any negotiations which go on with the Union Government within the period of standstill, of the Resolution of the General Assembly of the United Nations on 7th April, on South-West Africa, a Resolution in which the General Assembly took note
of reports of the terrorisation of, and armed action against, the indigenous inhabitants, and calls upon the Government of the Union of South Africa to desist from such acts; and requests the Committee on South-West Africa to submit to the General Assembly, at its sixteenth Session, a report on the implementation of Resolution 1568 (xv) as well as the present Resolution.
These actions must go on. As a member of the United Nations, we must do our duty in these respects, and we must do all in our power to help the United Nations Committee on South-West Africa to carry out that mandate which it has been given by the United Nations—all in our power, after 31st May, to see that that Resolution is carried out as it was intended to be.
We accepted the need for a Bill with temporary provisions governing our relations with South Africa before the final negotiations could be worked out. But we were surprised when the Bill actually appeared and we saw that it contained provisions for a standstill for as long as twelve months. The right hon. Gentleman has given various reasons this evening, which we have carefully to consider later, as to why he thinks that the necessary negotiations should occupy twelve months. He has assured the House that he intends to bring all this to a conclusion well within the period of twelve months, and I hope that he will do so.
The House must have regard to the effects upon public opinion outside of any decision here to preserve the status quo for such a long period. We must

ask ourselves what sort of effect it would have upon African opinion in particular. Will it appear to the peoples of Africa that Great Britain, in accepting the withdrawal of South Africa from the Commonwealth, did not take the attitude which the right hon. Gentleman himself took in our last debate; that, having used these grave words, he is now trying to keep things as they were? I know he is not, but when we consider this twelve months' period it is very important to consider whether we might be misunderstood.
I hope that a message will go out from the House tonight that will make it quite clear that our attitude to apartheid, to the United Nations Resolution on apartheid and on South-West Africa which I have just quoted, and to the many questions which must arise, is unmistakably what it should be, that we detest this principle of government under which South Africa is at the moment carried on and that we are going to do nothing which will in any way condone it or enable it to carry out that system more easily.
The Johannesburg Star of 15th April contained an article by its London correspondent, stating that
…direct negotiations are not likely to get under way before September or October.
Is that really true? Presumably that newspaper's correspondent in London has access, as such correspondents normally do, to authoritative information. Surely the right hon. Gentleman has no such intention in his mind. Surely he intends to begin the negotiations long before September. Indeed, if he is to fulfil the undertaking which he gave just now, that he will try to complete all these negotiations well within the year, he must be intending to start before September. I hope that when the Joint Under-Secretary of State replies to the debate, he will be able to deny this story that there is no intention to begin negotiations until September.
I said that there were two principles which should guide our action in this present interim period. One was that we should not in any way condone apartheid, which we have denounced, and which the Prime Minister has denounced in words which I have quoted. The other was the pledge given by the right hon. Gentleman in the earlier debate,


that leaving the Commonwealth must make a difference, that we could not allow it to be thought that leaving the Commonwealth made no difference. I am very glad indeed that he repeated that assurance tonight and, as I say, we hope that it will be duly noted outside.
I think that when we come to the Committee stage of the Bill we may need further and more detailed information to enable us to judge whether this period of twelve months is really necessary, whether, if all that has to be done can be done within twelve months, it could not be done within a shorter period. We may also wish to discuss subsection (3) of the Bill concerning the application of this legislation to Colonial Territories.
I want this evening to confine my attention to more general considerations. I want to allude for a moment to trade. What new sort of arrangements are we to work towards in these negotiations in regard to trade with the Union of South Africa? I think that it is obvious that trade between two nations is of benefit to both. If it were not, it would not take place. As my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition has already said, in the debate of 22nd March, we do not take the standpoint that all trade should cease. We do not advocate a complete trade boycott with South Africa. [Laughter.] This may amuse some hon. Members opposite. Perhaps they do not know that some of the other Commonwealth countries have already imposed a complete boycott.
Our position is not that. The Resolution before the United Nations, that there should be a complete boycott—in short, that economic sanctions should be used to enforce the resolution of the United Nations condemning the policies of South Africa—did not obtain the necessary two-thirds majority, so we are not now bound in that way.
We say that trade must and should go on to mutual advantage, and we think that an agreement ought to be negotiated to that effect as we would negotiate an agreement with some other foreign country whose policies we did not like—say, Spain, with whom I have no doubt we have a trade agreement. I certainly made one, when I was Secretary for Overseas Trade, with Franco-Spain, because it was to our advantage to undertake such a negotiation. Nevertheless, we think that in future trade

agreements with South Africa, because she will no longer be a member of the Commonwealth after 31st May, Commonwealth preferences will be totally inappropriate.
Let there be a trade agreement which is worked out in the ordinary way by negotiating around a table so that we obtain from it a fair advantage to suit the interests of our industry and our exporters, but do not let there appear to be any form of special preference. This would obviously be a gross breach of the right hon. Gentleman's own pledge, that leaving the Commonwealth must not leave things unchanged. It mut not appear that those who leave the Commonwealth will always get all the advantages of Commonwealth membership.
I am reminded of the provisions of the arrangement on trade hitherto within the South African Customs Union. The three High Commission Territories are comprised, with the Union of South Africa, in one Customs Union.

Sir Derek Walker-Smith: Would the right hon. Gentleman be good enough to give the House the view of the Opposition on these two questions? First, would they desire trade between this country and South Africa to increase, or decrease? Secondly, if it were to be to the benefit of our export trade that there should be some continued preferential arrangements with South Africa, would he then wish to continue them, or discontinue them merely to mark the fact that South Africa was not now in the Commonwealth?

Mr. Marquand: We want advantageous trade to increase—all trade which results in an improvement in our balance of payments. That goes without question. The second question seemed to have no meaning. The word "preferential" can be used in one or two senses. I am trying to say that there should be no preference such as that which applies to other Commonwealth countries. One can say no more than that and one would have to consider individual instances as they arose when negotiating trade agreements.
Are the High Commission Territories within the Customs Union entitled to a fixed percentage of the revenue of the Customs Union by agreement, or is there


some legislation which enshrines the principle? What is the value in sterling of the shares of the trade now going to each of the three territories? Is South African currency to be used in the territories in future, or what is to be done about that problem?
The terms on which these arrangements can continue—whatever they may be in detail, and I have asked for some illumination upon that, because I do not know exactly what they are—must be part of a total trade bargain with the Union of South Africa. We must ask ourselves how much each of the percentages of the total trade of the Customs Union is worth. If we encounter a possible threat to discontinue these arrangements, we ought to know the annual value and, whatever that annual value may be, we must be prepared, if the worst comes to the worst in the trade negotiations, to make up the loss from this country's own resources.
Linked with the problem of trade with the Customs Union is that of the employment of High Commission Territory manpower within the Union and the easy passage of workers to and from Basutoland or Swaziland, or whatever it may be, into and out of the Union. This right of passage was enshrined in the South Africa Act, 1909, but we know only too well that many things enshrined in that Act have now gone by the board, like the franchise in the Cape Province for persons of colour.
We must seek hard to defend the right of the peoples of the High Commission Territories, so long as they need to do so, to pass freely between the territories and the Union in their pursuit of employment. We must do all we can to ensure that when they are in employment it is on fair terms and that they receive fair treatment within the Union. There have been many cases, of which I and others have informed the right hon. Gentleman and his Department, of disgraceful brutality in the treatment of citizens of the High Commission Territories within the Union since the Sharpe-ville affair, and we must be zealous in the new circumstances about looking after the interests of our citizens there.
We were glad to have the unqualified reassurance of the right hon. Gentleman that these territories are the response-

bility of the United Kingdom and that the people who live in them remain British subjects, in the sense of being, with us, subjects of the United Kingdom and Colonies. We want to be sure that the duty of looking after them under the new arrangements, whatever they are, is satisfactorily discharged.
The responsibility will fall upon an ambassador once it is absolutely clear, beyond peradventure, that South Africa is a foreign country. The right hon. Gentleman told us that there would have to be an ambassador and that, for some time at any rate, the ambassador to the Union would also be responsible for the administration of the High Commission Territories.
Experience in this matter has not been very happy. There have been many complaints by those discharging duties within the High Commission Territories that the administration is inevitably cumbersome when it is in the hands of a High Commissioner whose main job is diplomatic and who is attached to the Government of South Africa, whether at Cape Town or Pretoria—dependent upon the time of year—when communication with him is at long range, as it were, and when decisions of major importance taken within the territories themselves have to be referred to him at Cape Town or Pretoria. We have been told again and again that delays result and that the administration is cumbersome.
More serious than that, when those responsible for the administration of the High Commission Territories live and move in circles within South African life which, by and large, uphold the policies of apartheid—taking the white South African point of view of race relations—to some degree their attitude of mind must be affected by those constant contacts. Even if that is not the case, many people in the territories suspect that that is so and that their interests are no represented as adequately and thoroughly as they should be. We have felt that for a long time and we have felt that the diplomatic representation should be separate from the detailed administration of the territories.
The right hon. Gentleman told us that no decision had yet been reached and I urge him seriously to consider the type of person working in the territories and


who is able to administer them sympathetically and with an African point of view, and who has had experience of working in African territories elsewhere. Such a person would be best suited to conduct the day-to-day administration and development of the territories. However, such a person is by no means necessarily the best suited to undertake the diplomatic representation.
I am not convinced that it is necessary, when we have an ambassador to the Union, to make him the administrator of the territories. Indeed, it would be extremely difficult to do so. As an ambassador, he would be employed by the Foreign Office, and no one would seriously suggest that the Foreign Office ought to run the High Commission Territories. That would not be wise. I know that for some time the Foreign Office ran the Sudan Political Service, which was a good service containing many brilliant men who worked very hard in the interests of the people of the Sudan. But that service has been broken up.
However, coming from our Colonial Territories are many men, experienced in administration and in all kinds of activities in African territories, who are now at a loose end. It might be better to recruit such men to administer the High Commission Territories, even if there were some difficulty in Whitehall because of the ambassador working for the Foreign Office and so responsible to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, and the men working in the territories being responsible to the Secretary of State for the Colonies. Surely the necessary co-ordination could be most effectively achieved in Whitehall, and there could be an African Committee of the Cabinet.

Mr. Sandys: I must correct the right hon. Gentleman on this point. The decision to give our representative in South Africa the title and status of ambassador does not in itself imply any decision about which Department here in Whitehall will be responsible for continuing the relations between Britain and South Africa. There are various exceptions, as in the case of Ireland, but no decision has yet been reached on that point.

Mr. Marquand: I fully appreciate that no decision has been reached and

that is precisely why I was trying to influence that decision and saying that the direct diplomatic representation should be separate from administrative responsibility for the High Commission Territories.
Hon. Members on both sides of the House attach enormous importance, in the immediate future of our relations with South Africa, to the development of the High Commission Territories. I hope that the Under-Secretary will be able to give us some encouraging news about the development of those territories when he winds up the debate. Are the recommendations of the Morse Report, published a year ago, now fully and entirely accepted by the Government?

Mr. Speaker: I have great difficulty in seeing how that explanation could be given, consistently with the rules of order. After all, the purpose of the Bill is the rather narrow purpose of a standstill in relation to our own law in the matter.

Mr. Marquand: I am sorry that I am not able to pursue that topic at any length. It seemed to me that it was an important part of our relationship with South Africa and that, as one of the territories was entirely within the territory of the Union, the extent to which it could be developed and the extent to which new employment opportunities could be created for the people within it, thus reducing the necessity for them to cross the border into the Union, were closely associated with the subject of the Bill. We hope that all that can be done by way of economic development to reduce the necessity for the passage of these citizens from what is their territory and ours jointly into the territory of the Union will be done. Not to risk provoking your wrath, Mr. Speaker, I shall not attempt to pursue that aspect of the problem any further.
The right hon. Gentleman said, rightly, in my opinion, that United Kingdom and colonial nationality, whatever it is called, should not continue to be retained by South African citizens after the end of the period of standstill, and that there should be separate South African nationality and that South African citizens would have to become foreigners and, under our law, would be treated like the citizens of


any other independent foreign country. We accept that that must be so. What about the interim period?

Mr. Sandys: I must ask the right hon. Gentleman not to rehash all the things I have said in different terms. I chose my words extremely carefully and I did not wish to prejudge a number of these issues. The right hon. Gentleman is now putting a rather precise interpretation on certain matters which I deliberately passed over rather vaguely.

Mr. Marquand: I am perfectly willing for the right hon. Gentleman to make quite clear what he said. It is asking rather a lot of me to expect that I should have taken down every word he used. I am bound to stand on my own account of What he said and what it appeared to me he said. I cannot take it all down in shorthand and then repeat it. In any case, that would be extremely boring and I would not try to do so.
I will ask a serious question. What happens in the interim period? Will South African citizens now in this country have the right to opt for our citizenship? There are many South African citizens in this country at present, some of them on rather short permits of stay. Have they the right to ask, if they think fit—I do not say that they will ask, for I have never asked those whom I have met—to be allowed to apply for British citizenship and, if they apply, will it be granted to them? I hope that during the temporary period, however long it may be, this right to opt for citizenship of this country which has been open to South African citizens will remain open and that those who wish to become British citizens in the full sense of the word and to continue as such will be allowed to do so.
One consequence of South Africa's new status will presumably be an agreement about defence. I was surprised that the right hon. Gentleman did not refer to this important subject. His High Commissioner in the Union at present has four air and military advisers and assistant advisers listed in the Commonwealth Relations Office Book. If they are important enough to be listed in that book, they are evidently discharging important functions. When this matter was discussed in the House on 22nd March the

right hon. Gentleman told us that defence agreements about the joint defence of the Middle East had already been abandoned. What other defence agreements are involved? Are they to be part of the discussions which take place during this interim period?
As with trade matters, nobody seeks to suggest that a defence agreement which was to the advantage of both parties would be a mistake, but I should like to know what will happen in the interim period about the sale of arms from this country to the Union of South Africa.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Major Sir William Anstruther-Gray): Order. I am reluctant to interrupt the right hon. Member, but I find it difficult to relate that question to the Bill.

Mr. Marquand: We are trying to elucidate what kind of negotiations the right hon. Gentleman may be entering into in the interim period. He has given us a list of certain legislation and has told us that there is a great deal more. He has also told us that other matters will be negotiated during this long period. We hoped that it would not be too far outside the scope of the Bill to ask the question which I asked: taking account of the fact that the Defence Minister in the Union of South Africa has recently announced that the purpose of his defence forces will be internal and that they will be concentrated on internal matters, shall we tolerate any continuance of the supply of arms to South Africa for those internal purposes?
Let me make it clear that we on this side of the House strongly object to any such supply. We regretted very much at the time of Sharpeville that armoured cars manufactured in this country had been used to shoot down those citizens. Since then we have been given an assurance that there have been no supplies of that kind since 1957. I realise that I am in some jeopardy in asking the question, but I hope that the Under-Secretary of State will be able, within the rules of order, to give us an assurance. We should regret it bitterly if any further supply were made in these new circumstances.
We are approaching a new relationship with the Union of South Africa and we want it to be a relationship which


will win for this country the confidence and affection of millions of Africans living in the Union and many more living outside the Union. We must make it seem in all our actions that we not merely refuse to condone the practice and policy of apartheid but that we sympathise with the people forced to live under that evil rule, that we shall do what we can to help them in the new circumstances and that we shall do nothing by the sale of arms or in any other way to strengthen the power which oppresses them.
This must be our attitude. That is what we say about both trade and arms—that there must be no preference for South Africa and no attempt to strengthen that Government in fulfilling the very policies because of which she left the Commonwealth.
Fortunately, despite all these evils, there are already signs here and there of some change of heart. There was a multi-racial convention recently in Pietermaritzburg in Natal uniting Whites, Asians and Africans, and it demanded major franchise reforms, the ending of the industrial colour bar, the ending of segregation, and the integration of education. These are all things which we warmly welcome. This is the sort of régime which we want to see develop within the Union. If and when it did, we should be glad to welcome the Union back again to the Commonwealth.
It is to encourage that kind of person, the African, the Asian and the European who is non-racial, and who stands for moderation in race relations, and it is to the end of winning their confidence and of giving them confidence that we should direct all our policies not only within this interim period, which we hope will not be too long, but, also, later, when we enter a new relationship with the Union.

Mr. R. H. Turton: If that is what the right hon. Member thinks, why should he try to break the Commonwealth Preference which benefits the very people he seeks to protect?

Mr. Marquand: The answer has been given by the Secretary of State. It must be clearly seen that those who leave the Commonwealth do not enjoy the special advantages enjoyed by those who remain in it.

7.54 p.m.

Mr. E. H. C. Leather: I disagreed with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State in only one remark which he made, and that was when he said that we already had had a full debate on the circumstances and events which led to this unhappy Bill. It was a very short debate indeed, and many on these benches, and I am sure on the opposite benches, had not the good fortune, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, to catch your eye during it. They therefore had no chance to discuss the background to the Bill.
I am sure that we all very much regret the need for the Bill. I certainly regret it as much as do any of my hon. Friends. The Bill precipitates a situation in which many decisions will have to be taken. I therefore hope that I shall not go wide of the rules of order in the very few minutes for which I intend to address the House in dealing briefly with the principles which it seem to me ought to guide us in taking the decisions which are precipitated by the Bill.
I am sure that everyone wishes us to be as generous, helpful and kindly to our many friends in South Africa as we can. Hon. Members have referred to the question of Preference; no doubt that was in the mind of my right hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Mr. Turton) who sits behind me. Of course, cutting off our noses to spite our faces would be not only ungracious but very foolish, and no one suggests that we should do that. On the other hand, if we allow ourselves to be guided too much by the principles of kindliness and trying to be helpful and generous, we shall be in a position of ourselves discounting the Commonwealth. This is the grave risk which we must bear in mind. While we wish to reach the most favourable agreement we can, if we go too far in that direction then the House and the Government will be saying, "The Commonwealth does not matter. We will treat you exactly the same whether you are in it or out of it." We must think very carefully before we allow ourselves to take that attitude.
No one forced South Africa out of the Commonwealth. The newspaper headlines were to the effect that she was "chucked out". In fact, South Africa freely and voluntarily decided to withdraw her application as a result of a


situation which she deliberately precipitated, and of which she had had due warning over many years from many of her friends, including many of us in the House.
It is said by some that the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference handled this matter badly. I strenuously disagree with that. I think that it was handled remarkably well, and I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, because it seemed to me that in that Prime Ministers' Conference there was another possibility, another danger far greater than this—the possibility that the Commonwealth would split, with all the whites on one side and all the coloureds on the other. That was the danger which that conference faced. Had that happened, the Bill which we are debating tonight would not have been concerned only with South Africa; it would have been concerned with the entire Commonwealth, because I do not believe for a moment that the Commonwealth could have stood that split.
It is said, too, that in some way we have infringed the sacred principle of not interfering in the domestic rights of another country. Some of my hon. Friends hold that view very strongly. I should like to explain why I believe, just as strongly and just as sincerely, that that argument will not stand up to reason. No civilised country in the world gives one the right to do everything one wants to do in one's own home, beyond a certain point. No man in his own home has the right to beat and maltreat his children. No man in his own home has the right to carry out chemical experiments and to pour nauseous and corrosive fumes over the homes of his neighbours. No man has the right in his own home to store explosives which can menace the lives of children playing in the garden next door. No civilised State could ever admit those rights.
It seems to me that the Nationalist Government of South Africa and their doctrine of apartheid had long since gone beyond the point at which what they were doing remained their own private business. This doctrine, this policy which has been stubbornly applied for ten years, has been a cancer in the Commonwealth.

It has bedevilled and embarrassed every member of the Commonwealth. It has inflamed passions and nourished hatred throughout the whole of Africa. It has many times called into doubt the good faith of Her Majesty's Government itself with the other 70 per cent. of the people who are citizens of the Commonwealth and who have coloured skins. I therefore believe that the decision which brought about this Bill was inevitable and right, from our point of view.
It is said, too, that having infringed this principle of non-interference, this can now apply to other members of the Commonwealth, and that a step has been taken which will lead to further damage. Some of my hon. Friends sincerely hold that view. I do not believe that there is any possible parallel.
The only heading under which this argument can be maintained in any other nation in the Commonwealth is that of immigration. Of course, there are other countries in the Commonwealth which restrict immigration. We in this country restrict immigration very severely. Frenchmen, Belgians, Italians or any other Western Europeans are not free to come to settle in this country when they like, but no one thinks of taking the matter to the United Nations. Our coloured friends in the West Indies impose restrictions even against each other.
But these are not issues on which any great principle is at stake. They are domestic affairs. The important fact is that in all these countries the coloured citizens who are already there have the full rights of the law. They have the vote. None of these countries has ever suggested any doctrine of second-class citizenship. In Australia and Canada, which are the two typical examples which some of my hon. Friends have used, there are many coloured citizens who were there before these policies of immigration control were introduced. They have full rights in the eyes of the law. They have full citizenship in both countries. They stand for and are elected to Parliament. South Africans, alas, put themselves in a completely different category on both these counts.

Mr. John Biggs-Davison: Mr. John Biggs-Davison (Chigwell) rose—

Mr. Leather: I cannot give way, since I have undertaken not to take too long.
The decisions which have to be taken under the Bill in the next twelve months apply not only to government but to many voluntary organisations. I am a member of the executives of a number of these, as I am sure other hon. Members are. I have had the privilege of representing Canada on the British Commonwealth Ex-Services League for ten years. Here we have to deal with the membership only of South Africans who fought and suffered with us in two world wars. In terms of human value and human anguish, I doubt whether there is a more difficult case where their membership has to be reviewed than that.
I believe that, unless we are guided in all these matters by a rigorous application of the principle of the importance of the Commonwealth, we will find our kindness and generosity leading us into a position in which we will have the worst of all possible worlds. There is a real risk that this could happen. The fact that South Africa has left the Commonwealth is not a happy one for any of us, but to suffer that and then to offend everybody else as well by trying to pretend that it does not matter would be courting disaster in every possible direction. It is the doctrine and stubborn application of apartheid which have brought us to the situation in which Her Majesty's Government have had to introduce this Bill. We must bear that in mind in all the decisions that we have to take as a result of the Bill.
Discrimination against a man because of his skin, or the shape of his nose, or his beliefs, is contrary to everything that this House stands for. It is destructive of the whole doctrine of liberty and of Parliamentary democracy. There surely can be no possible compromise between what this House stands for on the one hand, and the doctrine and stubborn application of racial prejudice on the other, and, much as I regret this situation, I believe the air is cleaner now that we have given up trying to pretend that there can be.
This is a sad landmark in the history of the Commonwealth, but it is not of our choosing, and I believe that great good can come out of this evil. I deplore the need for the Bill, but I shall support it and I shall support a rigorous appli-

cation of Commonwealth standards in the decisions that we have to take, because I deplore much more the explosive, arrogant and evil doctrine of racial prejudice which has made this Bill necessary.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: Will my hon. Friend kindly explain how immigration which affects two or more countries is a domestic affair and how a racial policy within a country is not a domestic affair?

Mr. Leather: In the few minutes available to me, I tried to answer that in the first part of my speech. No doubt because my arguments were not welcome to my hon. Friend, he ignored to listen to them. If he will do me the honour tomorrow morning of reading what I said, he will find the answer.

8.5 p.m.

Mr. Glenvil Hall: Like the hon. Member for Somerset, North (Mr. Leather), I deprecate the need for the introduction of this Measure. Nevertheless, the situation being what it is, I am glad that the Government have introduced it. In a sense it is only an enabling Measure. We shall consider the vital matters which are at issue in another Bill later in this Session, or in the new. Then we shall have to look in detail at the proposals that are made.
No doubt the next Bill will be very complicated, containing the results of agreements which have been made. The only question I wish to put to the Joint Under-Secretary of State on it is this. As much of what will be in that Bill will have been already negotiated with the South African Government, will the House, in spite of that, have an opportunity to amend or to delete parts of it if, in its view, that is necessary?
Like other hon. Members, I have a great affection for South Africa. I have many friends there and have received much hospitality from its people. All of us, I am sure, regret that we are debating this Bill today and that on 31st May South Africa will leave the Commonwealth. Some of us remember 1906, when the then Liberal Government made a very generous gesture to a defeated enemy which was unique. It was a tragedy that it did not help the two countries concerned to come wholeheartedly together. Normally,


when a gesture of that kind is made, it heals wounds, not opens them further.
Looking back, I cannot charge this country with having done anything wrong as a result of that 1906 settlement. We have had a number of Prime Ministers in South Africa since then and every one of them has been of Afrikaans nationality. There was Botha, then Smuts, then Malan, and now Verwoerd. None of them has been of British descent. It cannot be said by anyone in South Africa that the British have attempted at any time to superiority, or to run the country.
The referendum which led to the present situation was carried by a very narrow majority. In it, 1,600,000 people voted and the majority was not more than 55,000. However, 165,000 people did not vote. We should remember that narrow majority when we consider our future relations with South Africa.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough, East (Mr. Marquand) spoke of South Africa becoming a foreign country from 31st May. I should like to feel that we shall not look on her in that light. After all, there are many hundreds of thousands of people of British descent there. Many of them voted against a Republic. A large number of them are as bitterly opposed to apartheid and all that it stands for as we are in this country.
Although it is essential, for the reasons given by the hon. Member for Somerset, North, that we have to show that once a country leaves the Commonwealth it cannot enjoy all the privileges which go with membership, nevertheless South Africa will be in a different position from what one might describe as an ordinary foreign country. We must do all we can to continue friendly relations with her in the hope that the present situation will not last for ever.
The present Government of South Africa must come to the end of its mandate at some time and one day a different feeling will arise in that country. I hope that when that time comes South Africa will want to come back into the Commonwealth. If we, during that period, do nothing to alienate her still further, it will be all to the good. I therefore welcome the Bill and the speech made by the Secretary of State

for Commonwealth Relations. I hope that when we get the definitive legislation which is to follow it will be such as will keep the door open and will help eventually to bring South Africa back—which I am sure we all desire—into the Commonwealth of which every one of us is so justly proud.

8.11 p.m.

Mr. Anthony Fell: My hon. Friend the Member for Somerset, North (Mr. Leather) made, I felt, a somewhat odd speech. I am sorry that he is not here at the moment, but he obviously had to go out. He practically fell over himself to congratulate the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations on the way in which this issue has been handled. Moreover, he appeared to me to say that the important thing about any country within the Commonwealth was that it should be a democracy. He said that everybody should have a vote, that the only country in the Commonwealth where everybody has not got a vote is South Africa; and that, therefore, because of apartheid, and because everybody has not got a vote, South Africa must be got rid of.
I wish that my hon. Friend had not seen fit to withdraw so hastily. I am quite certain that Mr. Speaker does not give any warning of who is to speak next, and that my hon. Friend could not even have guessed that I was to speak next.
Is the Commonwealth based on so fragile a thing as—

Mr. A. Fenner Brockway: Democracy.

Mr. Fell: Yes, democracy, as it is understood by some of the youthful nations of the world.
Does my hon. Friend believe that the vote matters tuppence in Ghana? Does my hon. Friend believe that the Tamils, in Ceylon, think that Ceylon is a democracy? This is nonsense. This Bill does not arise because South Africa has apartheid. It arises because South Africa has apartheid one way—white against black. If South Africa were a mixture of black and black and there were apartheid of one race of blacks against another race of blacks—there would be no Bill. If India practised apartheid against the whites, there would be no Bill. There would be


no getting rid of India from the Commonwealth. If some nations of the British Commonwealth no longer allow or refuse to permit immigrants into their countries, do we do anything about it? Of course not, and quite rightly so. We are right in our attitude towards Ceylon, we are right in our attitude towards India, and towards Canada, but we are wrong—that is, the Commonwealth is wrong—in its attitude towards South Africa.
It is very easy for hon. Members such as my hon. Friend the Member for Somerset, North to wash their hands, like Pontius Pilate, and say that we have no responsibility for this. What do they say? They say that South Africa and Dr. Verwoerd have brought all this on themselves and that it had nothing to do with us. We played no part in it, and we must be happy, delighted, smug and content with this miserable little Bill. Even my hon. Friend the Member for Somerset, North wept crocodile tears and said that he regretted the Bill, but I believe the tears that were more honestly and deeply felt were those of the hon. Member who followed him—the right hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Glenvil Hall). It is not enough for us to weep crocodile tears over this affair.
It is not enough to sit smugly here and accept what is happening now. I hope and pray that I shall be in order—[Interruption.] Well, at least after the mammoth boredom created by the speech of the right hon. Member for Middlesbrough, East (Mr. Marquand) and the very sober and uninspired speech of my right hon. Friend, it is possible that it is not a bad thing for somebody to try to wake up the House.
Here we are discussing for the first time ever a Bill of this nature. Here we are discussing a tragic event, and how many hon. Members are present on either side of the House? [Laughter.] Of course, it is easy to laugh, because we are so powerful, because we have now got India and Pakistan on our side. We have now got Diefenbaker on our side, after coming hotfoot from President Kennedy to the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference and after being in bad odour with Kennedy over Cuba. Of course, we know that we are all right now, because we happen to be in a

great majority on the winning side. "Down with apartheid" and "Down with South Africa"—that is the reason for this Bill.
I should like to look for a moment at what has led up to the Bill. Does the right hon. Gentleman wish to intervene?

Mr. Marquand: The hon. Member has referred to the reason for the Bill, but he does not seem to have read it. It is to maintain the status quo.

Mr. Fell: Of course, I immediately gave way to the right hon. Gentleman, because of his great wisdom. He will be delighted to know that he is, in fact, quite right. It is to maintain the status quo for one year, but the whole tenor of his speech was that it should be cut down to less than one year.
I should like to see every conceivable reason advanced for keeping it going longer than one year and for trying to make it less severe. It could conceivably happen that if it were kept going longer than one year, something might happen to enable the breach to be healed. How has the Government of this country, the centre of the British Commonwealth for generations, the centre of something which, in the history of the world, has never been built on such proportions or on such a basis, the centre of something that gives mankind hope, the centre of the only base for enabling the small nations to keep their independence, got itself into this mess? How is it that we have arrived at this situation?
First, we have not had any Commonwealth policy. We have dithered, we have chased round Europe and across the Atlantic to the United States, but we have never had a policy for the Commonwealth. We hear of interdependence, and we are told that we must get into Europe. For what? Surely, even this Government should begin to wonder, since yesterday, whether it is urgent for Britain, and so safe, to get into Europe.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: There is nothing I see in the Bill about Britain getting into Europe.

Mr. Fell: I humbly apologise, Mr. Deputy-Speaker, for going so wide of order. If I may, I shall try to get within order by relating my grounds for saying that this is an unprecedented Bill.
There is no precedent for this Bill in our House of Commons. This is the first time that a country of the British Commonwealth of Nations has left the British Commonwealth. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] There are certain reasons for this. I should be most grateful if I may, as carefully as possible and relating it as much to the Bill as I can—very shortly, because I do not want to speak for too long—give the reasons leading up to the bringing in of the Bill.
The tragedy of the whole situation is not that we have become a nation of Little Englanders, but that we have a Cabinet composed of Little Englanders. We have a Prime Minister who, when he came back from his tour of the British Commonwealth—his first grand tour as Prime Minister—came back full of surprise at the greatness of this thing called the British Commonwealth. I was not surprised. Anyone who knows anything about the British Commonwealth is not surprised at the greatness of it, but our Prime Minister was. Then, because of difficulties in Europe and difficulties in America, he became so immersed in interdependence and European affairs that the Commonwealth was promptly forgotten. That is the reason for the Bill. The Commonwealth Relations Secretary may think this is funny, but I do not think it is very funny. I remember him advocating world police forces. I notice that he has not advocated them for some time, but I wonder if his mind has really changed. That hardly goes hand in hand with the great British Commonwealth.
It is not only the British Prime Minister who has helped to lead to the necessity for the Bill, by, for instance, his lack of leadership at the Prime Minister's Conference, which has just ended. One can hardly lead a conference if one has taken practically no interest in the Commonwealth for the period of years in which the Government have been in power. The present Minister for Education said only two or three years ago that it was impossible for us any more to expand Commonwealth trade and that, therefore, we must get into Europe. That is one of the contributory factors to the Bill. If the British Commonwealth is so ill-led

by this country, which must provide the leadership for the Commonwealth, that it no longer has any faith that we are to lead it, quite frankly anything can happen.
What, perhaps, gives me more faith than anything at the moment is that in the end, when we get a Prime Minister who is really a Commonwealth Prime Minister, these sort of breaches will be healed and we shall start to rebuild this organisation upon which the future peace of the world, apart from anything else, depends. What gives me hope is that I firmly believe that the British people are 100 per cent. behind the British Commonwealth. If, in addition to South Africa or any other country in connection with this Bill, I mention Lord Beaverbrook, or the Daily Express, people will sneer. Members of the Cabinet, some of my hon. Friends—not all of them, thank heaven, but some of them—will sneer at Lord Beaverbrook.
Let this be said, that however much they may sneer, the Daily Express happens to have the biggest circulation, apart from the Daily Mirror—and it does not do it on strip cartoons. Not only that, but it has had a consistent, straight pro-Commonwealth policy for years and years and it is the only newspaper in Britain that has.
The Daily Express is not a newspaper to sneer at. Although there are many things that appear in it with which one may disagree, it has done one thing for Britain which is great. It has been the one journal with a large circulation in this country which, through thick and thin, has backed the British Commonwealth and brought sense to bear on all these great problems. I have been drawn into that by my hon. Friend the Member for Somerset, North. Our trouble, as I see it, and what will lead to more Bills, is that the nation is being misled. It would be even worse misled by hon. Members opposite, I agree, but the nation is being misled until we are becoming, first Little Englanders, secondly, pro-Europeans, and thirdly, American satellites. This I believe to be the truth.

Mr. Michael Foot: It is the other way round.

Mr. Fell: I hope and pray that it will be the other way round.
Unless we can pull ourselves together and realise our own strength, this will be the tragedy. I wonder how many of the Cabinet really believe in the strength of the Commonwealth. Do they believe that here we have the responsibility of being the centre and the leaders of the greatest organisation of nations the world has ever seen? I am delighted to see my right hon. Friend nodding agreement. Then there will never be any necessity, if the right road is taken, for him ever again to talk about police forces under the domination of the United Nations.
The only chance for the future success of mankind, the only chance for us to pull through these terrible days, when nuclear weapons do not matter but what does matter is the breakdown all over the world of law and order, is that of having faith in ourselves and doing the job which is really necessary. The job which is really necessary is to strengthen, not to loosen or break up, by all means possible, even though it means great sacrifices for the people of this country, which they will willingly accept if they are led, this fabulous organisation of which we are the centre and on which the world depends.
If we do that then we can have an easy conscience, carry out our duties, and conceivably do the job which the United States is in no way fitted to do.

8.29 p.m.

Mrs. Barbara Castle: A greater wit than I can ever hope to be once said, "The hon. Gentleman engenders more heat than light." I listened with care to the speech of the hon. Member for Yarmouth (Mr. Fell), but at the end of it I find myself at a loss to know what exactly he is complaining of and who exactly he is "going for"—

Mr. Fell: Mr. Fell rose—

Mrs. Castle: No—the hon. Gentleman has made his speech. He must allow me a little more than thirty seconds before trying to make a second one.
The hon. Gentleman complained that we had this Bill because we had never had a Commonwealth policy. I should have thought exactly the opposite, that we have this Bill because at last we have a Commonwealth policy. South Africa has left the Commonwealth because, for the first time, the Commonwealth has

developed a coherent philosophy. That is a great step forward, and I am surprised that the hon. Member for Yarmouth, who claims to be such a protagonist of the Commonwealth, should not have realised it.
I assure him that one of the best pro-Commonwealth speeches that I have ever heard from the other side of the House was made this afternoon by his hon. Friend the Member for Somerset, North (Mr. Leather). I wish that that speech had been made by the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations when introducing this Bill. I think it quite inadequate that a Bill of this kind should be introduced as though it were a pure technicality. We were told there would be a few new enactments, a few legislative consequences—like a merchant shipping Bill or a few medical Bills—and that really was all that was involved. In the perfunctory manner which he has brought to such high professional pitch in his Parliamentary presentations, the right hon. Gentleman tried to brush aside all debate. He even tried to influence the Chair by inferring that anyone who tried to look at the wider issues would find himself out of order.
In fact, there is a doubt whether the House will be willing to pass this Bill. It should by no means be taken for granted. There are some hon. Members on this side who have considered opposing it because of the undue length of time which the Government wish to take in maintaining the status quo. That is a factor of no small consequence where it is considered against the background of the whole of the discussion on this subject.
It is an open secret that hon. Members opposite have always been divided upon this question. The hon. Member for Somerset, North was a lone voice crying in the wilderness on this issue. The hon. Member for Yarmouth objected to the fact that his hon. Friend the Member for Somerset, North left the Chamber so soon after completing his speech. But the hon. Member for Yarmouth has himself left the Chamber even more precipitately than his hon. Friend, and I am left even more in "mid-air". The hon. Member for Yarmouth has done one of the quickest vanishing acts in the history of the House of Commons. But I shall continue to address him undeterred.
Were the hon. Member for Yarmouth present, I should say to him that in fact the speech of his hon. Friend the Member for Somerset, North was a much more pro-Commonwealth speech than his, because it recognised that the Commonwealth faced the fact that the policies of South Africa were a challenge to its whole existence. Most hon. Members on this side of the House have no doubt at all how the Commonwealth should answer that challenge if it is to survive. But we know that hon. Members opposite had many doubts. The Prime Minister did his utmost to keep South Africa and her abhorrent policies inside the Commonwealth. It was only the stubborn resistance from other Commonwealth Prime Ministers which finally led Dr. Verwoerd to face the necessity for his exclusion from the Commonwealth.
It is against that background that we are discussing this standstill Measure tonight. We must, therefore, look at it in the light of the principles with which we each approach this situation because they will govern our attitude towards the powers for which the Government are asking.
I approach this categorically and clearly. I want South Africa back in the Commonwealth as soon as possible. I am second to none, certainly not to the hon. Member for Yarmouth, in my belief in the Commonwealth; in my belief in the exciting nature of this multi-racial voluntary association of peoples of all colours, classes, creeds and beliefs. I want it to be strengthened and to become a great balancing power in the world.
I want South Africa back, but that means that I want the final and total destruction of apartheid in South Africa, because that is the only basis on which South Africa can come back into the Commonwealth. It is from that point of view that I look at the Bill as part of the consequential decisions we have to make following Dr. Verwoerd's exit from the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference.
In the light of that, I am extremely anxious about the tone of the speech of the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations. I am deeply concerned about some of the mysterious hints he dropped. It is not good enough that on this occasion we should be fobbed off with a list

of minor legislative consequences which we all know are not the real substance of the matter. We all know that the consequences we have to face are the top-line vital ones of our economic, citizenship and defence relationships with South Africa, the position of the High Commission Territories, and so on.
It may be said that those do not exactly arise in legislative form, but some of them do. Certainly the citizenship issue arises, yet we are tonight being asked to approve a twelve-month standstill without any indication of the purpose for which the Government propose to use that period. Will they use it to soften the impact of the severance of the Commonwealth relationship? The noble Lord the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke) hopes so, and I know that many hon. Gentlemen opposite hope so too, but I hope that we shall use this period to increase the pressure on South Africa and so complete the work which was started at the Prime Ministers' Conference.
I rejoice at every sign that the people of South Africa have been shocked and dismayed by their exit from the Commonwealth. It shows that the Commonwealth means something, and it shows that there are influences which we can bring to bear on South Africa to abolish the evil policy of apartheid without expecting the downtrodden African peoples to rise in revolt and try to accomplish by their own—perhaps futile—bloodshed what world opinion ought to be achieving for them.
Because I want to get rid of apartheid in South Africa without more Sharpe-villes and without more black martyrs to the cause of human equality, I am dismayed that the Government Front Bench have not used this opportunity to warn South Africa that we do not intend to rob our fellow Commonwealth Prime Ministers of the fruits of their decision at Lancaster House by smuggling in new preference agreements or continuing existing ones.
It is an intolerable infringement of Commonwealth solidarity even to suggest or hint that trade should continue on the same basis as before. It cannot. It should not. We know, for instance, that under the Commonwealth Sugar Agreement South Africa is getting preferential treatment of the same kind


as Australia and the West Indies. She is getting a guaranteed market here for 158,000 tons of sugar at a preferential price per ton well above the free market price. It would be intolerable for the rest of the Commonwealth Prime Ministers, who have all sat in judgment upon her and said, "Your policies are a disgrace to everything the Commonwealth stands for," if we then said, "Of course, it will make no difference. You will get the same treatment as Australia or the West Indies." I suggest that that is the way in which to destroy the Commonwealth.
I want to know what is to happen over the citizenship question. I do not think that it is very satisfactory for the Secretary of State to make such an obscure speech that my right hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough, East (Mr. Marquand) had to try to interpret it to the House and then, when he did so, for the Secretary of State to get up and say, "Do not put words into my mouth," and to explain he did not mean this or that or the other. What did he mean? What did he mean by saying that South Africans would not become aliens? If the British Nationality Act is repealed, they will; and, if it is not, what alternative have the Government in mind?
We must realise that here there is a relationship between us and South Africa which is not reciprocal. We give to the citizens of South Africa more than they give to us. It is impossible for us, just because there is not that reciprocity, to continue, in the new situation, favoured relationships for South African citizens which they are not prepared to give to the other citizens of the Commonwealth. We cannot adopt the Eire solution, because South Africa will not have an open door policy for citizens of the Commonwealth as Eire does. Therefore, we have to face this citizenship question.
I should have thought it fairly simple. I should have thought that we ought to have made the position clear very quickly. Let us not forget that the South Africa United Front, which represents, among others, the African South Africans, has asked for no special concession. They are part of the world war on apartheid, and they do not ask for anything which would blunt the edge of world animosity towards the South

African Government. They say, "Repeal the British Nationality Act, and the quicker the better, so as to increase the realisation in South Africa that she is isolated and that her present Government is repugnant to all civilised peoples in the world."

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: Will the hon. Lady please face the consequences of what she is saying, in that those who will suffer by the sanctions she proposes as regards trade and as regards citizenship are, in the first place, the lowest-placed Africans in South Africa and, secondly, the white European, English settlers who have done everything they possibly can to obvert the policies of Dr. Verwoerd?

Mrs. Castle: I had not completed my remarks on citizenship. If the noble Lord had waited he would have heard that I was proceeding to point out that, although the South Africa United Front, which represents those very people of whom the noble Lord has spoken, has asked for no tempering of the wind to their dangerous situation, I believe we could and should do better than that for reasons which the noble Lord has mentioned.
I believe that, having severed the present citizenship relationships with South Africa, we should in their place declare that we will offer British citizenship to any immigrant from South Africa, whether he be one of our English brothers who does not wish to live under the Nationalist Republic, or whether he be an African South African, or any other South African, who comes to this country and who asks for British citizenship. We should declare that he should be given the right to have that citizenship, on condition that he surrenders his own. This, I believe, is the only way in which this problem can be solved. What stands between us and the solution is not a great technical difficulty, but simply a question of our political approach.
Do not let us under-estimate, in any negotiations that may take place over the High Commission Territories or over any other aspect of the new relationships, the strength of our bargaining power. Even taking into account South Africa's gold sales, that country still runs a deficit on her balance of payments which is met by the net inflow of capital. What is frightening the people of South


Africa at the moment even more than the moral issue is that the world's investors have got cold feet about the racialist policies of South Africa.
Harry Oppenheimer said recently that South Africa has lost £100 million of capital due to the moral opprobrium of the world towards her racialist policy. Some hon. Members may have read an interesting series of articles in the Guardian last September by Professor O. P. F. Horwood, of Natal University, and a fellow South African, on the consequences to South Africa of leaving the Commonwealth. He wrote:
The effect of South Africa's leaving the Commonwealth on the inflow of investment capital is seen to be wholly adverse on both the availability and the price of loans. The Union has already become less popular field for international investment, and it would certainly become a still less attractive proposition if divorced from the Commonwealth family. Commonwealth membership does confer undoubted international status on a country, and gives considerable assurance of political and economic maturity and responsibility of the potential investor.
When I was in Johannesburg covering the treason trial two or three years ago a Nationalist supporter spoke to me. He talked freely and frankly and said that he feared that the country was being ruined by the "Nats". He pointed out that capital inflow was drying up. We ought to encourage that. Britain's aim should be to bring this kind of pressure to bear on the South African Government, because we distinguish between Government and people. We in Britain are out to help those who are fighting this evil South African Government, and we should not use this breathing space, this space of twelve months which is totally unnecessary, to find ways of protecting this evil Government from the consequences of their own policy. We should, instead, be using this period to increase the economic and moral pressures, so that we can keep our Commonwealth together on the basis of a new Commonwealth policy and, in that way, help to bring about the destruction of apartheid.

8.50 p.m.

Mr. John Biggs-Davison: The hon. Lady the Member for Blackburn (Mrs. Castle) said that she wants South Africa back. I, too, want South Africa back and, like the hon. Lady, I want to see the present policy of the

South African Government altered. But I believe, also, that if we seek to impose our will from outside upon the South African Government—and the hon. Lady spoke of moral and economic pressures—and we make the sort of speeches to which the House have just listened, we will strengthen the support which Dr. Verwoerd now enjoys in that country. I believe that the South African whites, who are proud people, will be the more inclined to rally behind the Nationalist Government though many of them, like the Nationalist with whom the hon. Lady talked in Johannesburg, have grave misgivings about the destiny of their country and under the policy now being pursued.
It has been said that we learn from history only that nobody ever learns from history. Spain has been mentioned from the Opposition Front Bench. There was the demand for sanctions against the Spain of General Franco. Spain was ostracised by the international community and the result was that the dictatorship of General Franco was consolidated. If we try to proceed by way of boycott and economic sanctions all we shall do, as my noble Friend the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke) has pointed out, will be to make the difficult life of the poorest section of the population more difficult.
If a young Member of the House may be allowed to say it, I liked very much what was said by the right hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Glenvil Hall). Like all of us who have seen South Africa and realised what a very great country it could become, he felt a deep affection for South Africa and, therefore, a poignant regret at the necessity for the Bill for which the House has been asked to give a Second Reading. I thought that the speech of the right hon. Member for Middlesbrough, East (Mr. Marquand) was of a different order. It was long, and its tone was mild and moderate, but its whole import was vindictive.
We on this side of the House deeply regret the departure of South Africa from the Commonwealth, but the right hon. Gentleman seemed glad of it. He wanted to widen the breach and did not want to seek any way of healing it. I agreed with the right hon. Gentleman in two things. Like him, I have been in Sierra Leone in peace and in war and have fallen a little under its spell. I should like to echo the good wishes


which the right hon. Gentleman extended to its people on attaining sovereign status within the Commonwealth. The second point with which I fully agreed was his welcome to the non-racial and inter-racial tendencies now appearing within the Union of South Africa.
I deplore the necessity for the Bill, but I support it on the understanding that it is to be a temporary scaffolding for a more lasting structure of close co-operation between the United Kingdom, and the Union of South Africa, of close co-operation in the practical working of the sterling area, and of cooperation within the spirit of the sterling area, and a co-operation within the spirit of the 1955 Defence Agreement for the use of Simonstown and other facilities. Whatever the difficulties which now will appear, a common defence is necessary in Southern Africa. It is necessary to the Commonwealth, including those members who under the shield of others can pursue a policy of neutrality. Common defence is necessary in Southern Africa against aggression, against Communism and against subversion and disruption.
This Bill is the consequence of a flagrant failure of Commonwealth statesmanship. Since London is the traditional scene of Commonwealth conferences, and our Government are the hosts to the Prime Ministers from overseas, and our Prime Minister is the chairman at these conferences, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom must accept a heavy burden of responsibility for the melancholy breach which it is the purpose of this Bill to start to mend. I suppose that this will be an arid and technical Bill, but even my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations—with his calm, inflexible, almost demi-godlike demeanour—spoke of "human problems".
I think of constituents and of close relatives of mine devoted to the Commonwealth connection whom Parliament should seek to save from being severed from the bond of common citizenship. This Bill aims to deal with the departure of a fellow member—and a founder member—of the Commonwealth. It is not just a question of getting rid of Dr. Verwoerd, but a question of the departure of South Africa.
The very same conference that enacted this tragedy welcomed the Republic of Cyprus; perhaps a rather odd exchange—Cyprus for South Africa. That very same conference welcomed the Republic of Cyprus, where there is a constitutional entrenchment of separatism between communities, and where there is a constitutional establishment of separate municipalities for Greeks and for Turks. But, of course, we did not welcome Archbishop Makarios, but the whole people of Cyprus—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Member, but I think that this is getting rather a long way from the provisions of the Bill.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: I apologise for mentioning the Republic of Cyprus in connection with the Commonwealth Conference, the result of which has necessitated the Bill, but perhaps I am in order in saying something about the background to that, as have other hon. Members on both sides already.
We have had this exchange. In a sense, we have connived at another Great Trek of the Afrikaners. The Afrikaners are like the British. They have faults. But, for all their faults and narrowness, they are a brave people and an honourable people. They are making another Great Trek away from hostile outland influences, but also—and this is what I regret—away from the more genial and moderating influences of their Commonwealth partners.
The hon. Member for Blackburn rightly spoke of distinguishing between Governments and peoples. We are not just parting company with the Republicans of South Africa, but with the Monarchists, too; not only with the Afrikaners, but with the English-speaking Africans; not merely with the Europeans, but with the Asians, the Coloureds and the Bantu; not just those who advocate the policy of apartheid, but those who seek a better way.
Constructive minds are appearing in the ranks of the Nationalists themselves—there is Japie Basson—there are many in the United Party, and there are leaders of the Dutch Reformed Church who are looking for a better way. We are parting company with those and others who, over the years, have fought through


generations, for the idea of Rhodes—for the Rhodesian ideal—of equal rights for all civilised men.
We lose the sons and survivors of the South African Infantry Brigade, whose deeds have been recorded by a former Member of this House, the father-in-law of my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen, South (Lady Tweedsmuir). Three times that brigade was annihilated; three times it was raised again; three times, by its sacrifice, it saved the British front. About one-third of that brigade were Afrikaners. Most of them had fought against Britain in the Anglo-Boer War. Many of them had long resisted the Peace of Vereeniging and refused the oath of allegiance.
The first Lord Tweedsmuir wrote:
History has seen many fine stocks brought within the pale of our Empire, but none stronger and finer than this one which turned defeat into victory and led captivity captive.
On 22nd March, when we had our earlier debate, my right hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Mr. Turton) spoke of his services alongside Dan Pienaar's 1st South African Division, in the Second World War. That formation gave gallant service when the lifelines of the Commonwealth in the Middle East were well-nigh cut.
Mention has been made of the High Commission Territories. What of Swaziland and Basutoland, completely surrounded by South African territory?—Basutoland, in particular, relies on imports of mealies from the Union and on its export market in the Union for its wool and mohair. The Basutos depend for jobs in the mines of the Rand. The High Commission Territories are as dependent on the Union as Nyasaland is on the economy of the Central African Federation. But for its Customs Union with South Africa, whereby Basutoland shares in the receipts of the Customs but pays nothing towards their collection, Basutoland would be in extreme economic difficulties.
The first Lord Tweedsmuir spoke of turning defeat into victory when he was speaking of the Afrikaners who served the Crown in the First World War. I am afraid that this legislation has now become necessary because victory has been turned into defeat and the impatience and the intolerance of the Com-

monwealth as a whole has enabled Krugerism to triumph for longer than, in my view, was really necessary.
It all goes back to when my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister discovered Africa. He made a series of speeches. He went on a lecture tour of Commonwealth capitals in Africa and ended up in Capetown on 3rd February, 1960. I think that my right hon. Friend showed undue humility, because he must have underestimated the effect of his speech to both Houses of the South African Parliament. For Africa is not Britain, Africa is not Europe, and when a British Prime Minister spoke, as he did, of the undoubted wind of change blowing through Africa, it appeared to many almost as an incitement to see that the wind blew even harder and rose to hurricane force. It looked, in that fatal year of 1960, as though the fertile plant of civilisation might have been blown right out of South Africa to the Antarctic.
Then came Sharpeville. Everyone remembers Sharpeville, but very few remember Cato Manor. Understandable emotion swept the Western world and erupted in Trafalgar Square, outside Africa House. I can remember the mood in this House at the time, and how hon. Members opposite disliked my plea that we might wait until the result of the judicial inquiry before we pronounced our judgment on the affair at Sharpeville. Since then the House of Commons has spent more time on Sharpeville and regretting, as I regret, the carnage there, than it has on all the atrocities in the Congo and the atrocities in Angola which, if I may borrow words from Mr. Kenneth Kaunda, of Northern Rhodesia, "make Sharpeville look like a children's picnic."
When my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister made his famous "wind of change" speech it was received with great politeness by his hosts. I wonder how he would have got on if he had made a speech about the white Australia policy in Canberra, bearing in mind that Mr. Menzies said in Australia recently—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: Order. I am reluctant to interrupt the hon. Member again, but this is a Bill, a standstill Measure, designed to maintain unchanged the laws governing the relationship between the United Kingdom


and South Africa for a period of one year. I hope that the hon. Member will keep his speech directed to the Bill.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: I was trying to explain how the necessity for this Bill, arose, Mr. Deputy-Speaker. I was tracing the antecedents of the Bill to the Capetown speech of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister.
I think that it is quite clear that this Bill would never have arisen, that South Africa would never have had to withdraw an application to continue in the Commonwealth, because no such application would have been necessary, had there been no referendum. I believe that, unfortunately, the referendum decided against the Monarchy and for the Republic very largely because of the intemperate criticism which has been made of the Nationalist Government in South Africa.
I remember meeting English-speaking South Africans doing a job in the Copper-belt, in Northern Rhodesia. They told me that they would vote Republican because they were sick and tired of being told their business by the United Kingdom. This Bill is consequential on the failure of Her Majesty's Government to maintain the fundamental principles which were common both to the Commonwealth and to the United Nations to which the right hon. Member for Middlesbrough, East referred.
I am as much a believer as anyone else in the multi-racial Commonwealth. I am perhaps the only hon. Member of this House to have served in India before, and Pakistan after, independence. My first chief was an Indian. Since I entered politics I have always refused to be drawn, usually by Conservative audiences, into criticisms of Ceylon, or Ghana, or India.
I admire so much what Mr. Nehru once said about the Commonwealth. He said that the Commonwealth brought a touch of healing. This Bill, however, is part of a drastic and dangerous surgical operation. Human flesh is being cut from a growing organism, and a deep and grievous wound inflicted on this expanding Commonwealth which Smuts once described as "always going forward to new destinies".
The Commonwealth method of cooperation is that the independent nations

should use their sovereign powers to work together for the common good and for "mutual benefit". "Mutual benefit" is one of Mr. Nehru's principles, the Panch Shila. Another of them is "non-interference in the internal affairs of an economic, political or ideological character". We are party to those principles because our Government was one of the Governments which supported their embodiment in a Resolution of the General Assembly of the United Nations passed in December, 1957, with the sole abstention of Nationalist China.
The principle of non-interference in internal affairs of an economic, political or ideological character was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, and until now it used to be one of the fundamental principles of the Commonwealth. The United Kingdom was much attacked and Her Majesty's Government were much criticised by the party opposite, because sometimes they were almost alone in standing up for the Charter and for that principle. But it is sometimes more important to be right than in a majority, and I very much regret that our flight from principle is now being exposed.
I met Dr. Verwoerd when he was in London and I do not think that he is a liar. Many things can be said about him, but not that he tells lies. He told the House of Assembly, in Capetown, that it was not correct that he had agreed to a discussion of South Africa's racial policies at the recent Prime Ministers' Conference. He said that he had been induced to do so. Perhaps my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will explain whether Dr. Verwoerd is right or wrong. If he was induced to do this thing, who induced him?
I understand from reports from the Union that the South African Prime Minister said that his position at the Conference was that South Africa's continued membership should be disposed of before there was a debate on Africa at the Conference. When he was told that some member countries would discuss South Africa's racial policies, his reaction had been that if that was done he would have something to say about Ghana's policies. However, when the constitutional questions were discussed, there was an immediate attack on South Africa. He could then have objected because, under the terms of the arrangement, that discussion could not have taken place until


the following day, but, and I quote from a leading South African newspaper:
The chairman, Mr. Macmillan, intimated to him that it would perhaps be better to let the discussion proceed.
To this, Dr. Verwoerd reluctantly agreed. We have heard very little of what really happened in the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference, and perhaps we may have some enlightenment from the Government Front Bench before the debate is over.
I was struck by the courtesy, the constancy, the courage and the obstinacy of Dr. Verwoerd. He believes that apartheid is right. He believes that it can prevail. We must prove him wrong. The best way we can do that is to make a success of our policy of non-racialism, of partnership, in the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland.
I hope that when we put the flesh on the bare bones which have been presented to us today we shall see to it that we have common citizenship arrangements—and I do not give tuppence for the legalisms of the Front Bench opposite. We should see to it that our relations are as close as with the people of Eire. We should see that the trade preferences are maintained. When it was in power, the Labour Party maintained them with Burma when Burma left the Commonwealth. We should see, for our own British interests, that our defence arrangements are continued. We should sometimes recall the South African infantry brigade in the First World War and the South African Division in the Second World War. We should sometimes remember them and not always be thinking of Mr. Louw and Dr. Verwoerd. Let us see to it that we keep our friendships in repair.
The other day I came across something which General Smuts said long ago. Speaking in the days before a Liberal Government abandoned British responsibility for the coloured people and the black people and the Asians in South Africa, in what for the Afrikaners who fought against us, was a terrible time, he said:
We stood alone in the world, almost friendless among the peoples, the smallest nation ranged against the mightest Empire on earth. And then one small hand, the hand of a woman, was stretched out to us. Strangest of all, she was an Englishwoman.

There is another Queen on the Throne today. I hope and believe that long before her reign is over South Africa will be back within the Commonwealth and that we shall forge new bonds of friendship and common interest.

9.17 p.m.

Mr. John Stonehouse: If I thought that the object of the Bill were to maintain relations between our two countries on the lines suggested by the hon. Member for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison), I should vote against it. Now that South Africa has left the Commonwealth, I do not believe that we should maintain the facilities and the advantages of Commonwealth relationship, and the hon. Member for Chigwell seemed to want those advantages to continue.
I was glad that in a speech earlier by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mrs. Castle) a note of reality was brought into the debate. We are not discussing a static situation. This is not merely an administrative Measure to put the laws in order. This is something which affects the future well-being of millions of people. They are looking to see what we intend to do to bring home to the Government of Dr. Verwoerd how we regard his policy.
I believe that it is thoroughly consistent of the House, in passing the Measure and also preparing for a new, and I hope a totally different, relationship with the Union to say again that we condemn apartheid and that we condemn Dr. Verwoerd's policies. This is consistent with the attitude which the House has taken in the past. In particular, a year ago a Motion was passed unanimously by the House, with which I believe all hon. Members of the House still agree, with the possible exception of the hon. and gallant Member for Wells (Lieut.-Commander Maydon), who has left the Chamber. That Motion condemned apartheid and called upon the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference of a year ago to examine the position. It also said—and these are significant words—that a solution to the problem in South Africa can be arrived at only on the basis of complete equality. That means one man, one vote. It means equal rights for all men, and not the curious distinctions and


slogans which were thrown out by the hon. Member for Chigwell, such as "Equal rights for all civilised men," and slogans of that description, which mean nothing.

Mr. Biggs-Davison: It was Cecil Rhodes who said that, not the hon. Member for Chigwell.

Mr. Stonehouse: I happen not to agree with it because it leads to a number of questions all subject to different interpretations. I believe in absolute equality, and I believe that the Commonwealth must be based on this concept; it must be based on it in Rhodesia, and also in the Union of South Africa if that country is to come back into the Commonwealth relationship. I agree with all those who said that they hope that the Commonwealth will again accept South Africa into the Commonwealth, but it must be on the basis of a complete change in the policies which are adopted in that territory.
As this House voted against the policies of apartheid, I assume that we therefore hope either that Dr. Verwoerd will change his policies or that the Government of Dr. Verwoerd will fall. Surely that is the assumption. The House will therefore not want to encourage a relationship with South Africa which will bolster up the policies of apartheid and continue to give encouragement to Dr. Verwoerd in his oppression and in his aggression against the overwhelming mass of people who live there.
I agree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough, East (Mr. Marquand) in hoping that a message will go out from the House to the South African Government in no uncertain terms, and I am disappointed that the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations gave us such a vague and misleading speech in introducing the Bill. He admitted that he meant to be vague. This is not good enough. We are examining the future relationship of this country with the Union of South Africa. We expected clear answers to questions which the Secretary of State knows are already in our minds.
Indeed, last week he indicated during Questions that he would be able to give us an answer today to the question of the future administration of the High

Commission Territories and the administrative capital of Bechuanaland. Although we expected an answer today to those questions, we have had no answer. May I ask the Under-Secretary of State, who has been left holding the brief, to give us an answer to some of these points when he replies to the debate. When are we to expect a statement about the future administration of the High Commission Territories? When are we to expect a statement on the implementation of the Morse proposals for the economic development of the Protectorates?

Mr. Speaker: Order. I restrained the right hon. Member for Middlesbrough, East (Mr. Marquand), because I thought that those questions were outside the permissibility of order on this Measure. I may have been wrong, but I cannot allow the hon. Member for Wednesbury (Mr. Stonehouse) to ask these questions when I did not allow the right hon. Gentleman to ask them.

Mr. Stonehouse: We are discussing the relationship between this country and the Union which will exist for the next twelve months. The relationship with the Protectorates of Swaziland, Basutoland and Bechuanaland, for which we are directly responsible, is very much concerned with our relationship with Dr. Verwoerd's Government. I submit with respect that we cannot discuss our relationship with the Union of South Africa without discussing how we are to administer the Protectorates. These Protectorates depend, as the hon. Member for Chigwell has already indicated, on the receipts from a Customs Union. There is already a large export of labour from the three Territories in particular from Basutoland, and I believe that we cannot discuss the relationship which we must have with the Union without discussing what we shall do about the Protectorates.
I therefore hope that the Government will give us a clear answer about the administration of these three territories. Shall we have a separate administration? The Secretary of State made a very curious intervention during my right hon. Friend's speech. Are we to understand from his intervention that the Commonwealth Relations Department may continue to be responsible for our relations with Dr. Verwoerd? Are we


not entitled to a clear answer about that today? We shall expect an ambassador to be responsible for our relations, and these would be under the Foreign Office and would not be conducted by the Commonwealth Relations Department. We expect a separate Commissioner to be appointed for the administration of the Protectorates, and we hope that enough money will be made available on the lines of the Morse Committee's Report to ensure the economic development of the Protectorates.
I believe that it is wrong for us to encourage British-protected persons from these Protectorates to go in large numbers to work within the Union and that we must supply alternative means of employment for them. We have all condemned the situation in the Union. We condemn apartheid. We condemn the slavery which exists there. How can we expect British protected persons to go to live under that regime? I therefore hope that we will have a positive indication of the measures to be taken to improve the economic situation in the three Protectorates and to provide increasing opportunities for employment. We should not continue to condone the slavery and the employment of migrants on the present lines.
I should like elucidation of one point made by the Secretary of State. He said that he welcomed Dr. Verwoerd's statement that South Africa will remain in the sterling area. I hope that we do not agree to that. I hope that South Africa will not be given facilities in the sterling area and that preferences will not be allowed to her. I hope that we will make it quite clear that these benefits can no longer be extended. I should like to know what consideration the Government have given to South Africa remaining within the sterling area and how this affects the continuation of the preferences.
Britain should also make quite clear in the United Nations what our position is concerning the mandate on Southwest Africa and should vote for that mandate being returned to the United Nations and, if necessary, Britain should take over responsibility for administering the mandate. It may be that South Africa is entitled to pursue internal policies of which we do not approve, but the Government of South Africa are not entitled to pursue such policies in a

mandated territory for which they are not independently responsible. They must return their reports to the United Nations and the United Nations should have the opportunity of withdrawing the mandate from the Union.
I wish to ask the Joint Under-Secretary of State about a comment which has been canvassed elsewhere of the mandate being extended, not to the Government of the Union of South Africa, but to the Queen, which will enable Great Britain to step in to take over responsibility for it in the name of the monarchy. Is not this the case and are not we entitled to say to the Union of South Africa that, in view of the changing status of the Union, of the change to a Republic and of South Africa leaving the Commonwealth, we expect the South-West African mandate to be transferred to us?
Let us in this House remember that we are discussing, not merely the future administrative arrangements between two countries, but the future of millions of people. What have they just said through a convention which met at Pietermaritzburg? On Saturday, 25th March, a meeting of 1,400 delegates representing 145 organisations took place. They said that the Government had refused to meet the just grievances of the people and
thinks only in terms of brute force".
This representative assembly stated:
If the Nationalist government refuses to call this convention
which would draw up a constitution for all the peoples of South Africa,
we call upon the African people to refuse to co-operate with such a Republic or with any form of government which rests on force and suppression.
The fact is that these people are agitating against a dictatorship, against a form of Nazism and Fascism. We cannot fail to hear their plea and I hope that through the United Nations we will continue to make our position clear. If the United Nations calls on the nations of the world to operate a trade boycott against the Union of South Africa, we must enter into that trade boycott and use trade pressures in order to bring the Government of the Union of South Africa to their senses.
There are far too many parallels between the situation in South Africa and


the situation in Algeria. Unless the people in South Africa who are now in political control can be brought to their sense and made to realise that their policies must be changed, there may indeed be a vary great danger of civil war breaking out in South Africa and, possibly, outside countries playing a part through intervention, and, indeed, the whole matter exploding into an international civil war, on the lines of the present situation in Algeria.
I therefore hope that the Government will follow through the policies already declared from the Dispatch Box and will not hide behind evasive phrases and sanctimonious words. Let there be a consistent policy declared from that Box, and let it be a policy which will help to improve the situation in South Africa and help to bring an end to the policies which have been pursued there.

9.31 p.m.

Mr. F. M. Bennett: I content myself with remarking, about the speech of the hon. Member for Wednesbury (Mr. Stonehouse), that I was not at all sure whether he was more anxious to bring down the South African Government, which he dislikes, or to help the South African peoples of all races who are living under that Government at the present time. It certainly seemed to me that he was more anxious to be the first than the second.
During the debate, hon. Members have spoken from both sides of the House with such obvious conviction and very strong views that, unless one clarifies one's position to begin with, one is almost placed in a position in which if one regrets the departure of South Africa from the Commonwealth one is accused of being pro-apartheid, and if, on the other hand, one expresses joy, one is thought to be anti-apartheid. Let me say first that that is a completely nonsensical interpretation. In fact, there are just as many people who regret the departure of South Africa from the Commonwealth but who are as firmly anti-apartheid as anybody else.
I can say in all humility that in every speech which I have made and in every activity in my political life outside, I have shown my firm conviction that there is no justification at all for discrimination based on the colour of one's skin. Indeed, one could go a little bit

further than that and say that all over the Commonwealth at the moment the common aim is that we are trying to subscribe to the doctrine, as my hon. Friend the Member for Somerset, North (Mr. Leather) said earlier, of considering our fellow-men without regard to the colour of their skin or the shape of their noses.
Having said that, one is, and I am, wholeheartedly against apartheid, I would add that I am against it for two reasons. The first is that, as my hon. Friend made clear, it is utterly immoral, and, secondly, as practised in the Union of South Africa, it is futile and doomed to failure, for a whole series of reasons with which it would be wearisome to trouble the House tonight.
I am not only anti-apartheid, but I am also singularly anti-humbug, and to some extent, I feel that tonight we have been treataed to a good dose of humbug. I am told that there are two reasons why we should rejoice that South Africa is leaving the Commonwealth. The first is because she practises racial discrimination. I have already declared my position on that, and I think that a majority of the House agrees with my hon. Friend in deploring racial discrimination, as I do. My hon. Friend said that he did not Chink it applied anywhere else in the Commonwealth—discrimination on the colour of the skin or the shape of the nose. My hon. Friend springs from Canada, where there is a policy of racial discrimination against the entry of citizens of the Commonwealth. Yet Canada bases her policy on precisely these two things—the colour of the skin and the shape of the nose. Anybody who has been on the frontier of Canada and has seen people from the West Indies trying to get into Canada knows that what I am saying is perfectly correct.

Mr. Leather: As my hon. Friend has attacked me, may I interrupt him? Perhaps I did not make the distinction perfectly clear, but in fact I did not say what my hon. Friend says I said. I pointed out that there were immigration regulations but in no country in the Commonwealth but South Africa was it the law that those with coloured skins were second-class citizens and had not the right to vote. That statement is unarguable.

Mr. Bennett: I am sorry if my hon. Friend thinks it was an attack on him


because in any case I was agreeing with much, but not all, of what he said. To say that it is more moral to want to keep out people of the wrong colour than to treat them differently when they are inside, however, shows that he has a different interpretation of morals than I have. If we move elsewhere in the Commonwealth we find an openly declared policy in Australia called "Keep Australia White". I suppose my hon. Friend would say that that is perfectly moral provided coloured people are not allowed to get in first. I am afraid I cannot go along with him in his interpretation.
It is not only in those two countries within the Commonwealth that we find this sort of thing, but very recently in an African Kingdom it was decided on race reasons alone that because the brother of a certain reigning African monarch had married a white girl he would be dispossessed for ever of the hereditary throne in that country. That warranted only about two small lines in The Times, but imagine what would have happened if it had been the other way round in any other territory.
It is not only necessary to be anti-humbug but also to be anti-smug. We in this country cannot regard ourselves as standing in a white sheet in this matter. There are hon. Members on both sides of the House—I do not happen to belong to them—who are pressing the Government of the day to introduce restrictions which, whatever the overt reason given, are based on race and race alone. Therefore, do not let us have humbug and be smug when others have racial stresses infinitely greater than those which have caused certain hon. Members here to take an extremely strong line on racial lines.
Another reason that I have heard why we should discriminate specifically against South Africa and not other countries is lack of democracy and lack of the "one man, one vote" principle there. I do not know whether the word "hooey" would be permitted as a Parliamentary word, but that is the language which should be used in this context. How much of democracy as we understand it is being practised in Ghana today, or in Ceylon where we have seen a free Press banished altogether and discrimination practised

against one racial element? How much democracy as we know it is there in a country for which I have great affection, Pakistan, today? I do not happen to think that all these criticisms I have made—and I am quite prepared to admit that there are some self-criticisms we ought to make—are a justification for interfering with the Commonwealth membership of those countries. All I am submitting is that we should not only be anti-humbug and not too smug, but we should be a little logical as well.
You, Mr. Speaker, might ask then why I support this Measure which is before the House in view of what I have said, although it would in my view be logical to assume that I do support it. I support it perhaps for a different reason from the reasons why some hon. Members support it. I think that it will do something to minimise the damage which flowed from what happened a short time ago. No so long ago right hon. Members on the Government Front Bench were openly hoping that the outcome of the Prime Ministers' Conference would be that South Africa would be able to stay in the Commonwealth for almost exactly the reasons I have stated—that it is not our business to lay down what rules and what form of Government a Commonwealth country should have. Since then, there has been what I regard as a regrettable tendency to say that this is the best of all worlds and that this is the best result. I think it is better to speak honestly and to say that we worked very hard to try to keep South Africa in but we failed. It is a matter for regret that this Measure has to be put before us to minimise the damage which flowed from a failure of declared British policy which was to try to keep South Africa in.
I repeat that I am saying all this in the context of my earlier remarks. I yield to no one in my dislike of certain practices obtaining in South Africa at present, as I also yield to no one in my dislike of certain practices obtaining in other parts of the Commonwealth. It has been said—I think this a little coy as well—that we are sorry that all this has happened, but as soon as South Africa changes her policy we shall be pleased to have her back. Do we realise what we are really saying? Let us assume that there is a change in the Government of South Africa; that


a Government is returned with a totally different policy and one which we could accept. Let us assume that there is a certain amount of racial integration and a certain amount of multiracial political rule, and so we welcome South Africa back into the Commonwealth. Then there is another election and the Nationalists are returned. Shall we call another conference and throw South Africa out of the Commonwealth again? And then, in another nine years, after another election which has gone the other way, shall we ask her to come back? And shall we do this with all the other countries of the Commonwealth which happen to depart meanwhile from the high standards we choose to set for others but possibly ignore ourselves?
When we make these criticisms; when we say we want to punish South Africa; when, in the words of the hon. Member for Wednesbury, we want to bring the Government to their knees, whom are we trying to help, and in what fashion? It is easy to salve one's conscience, because one disagrees with a Government, by passing critical Motions and then to go away thinking that one has cleansed one's own soul by being critical about other people. But I am not sure whom it is we are trying to help. Who will be the first people to suffer as a result of boycotts and economic sanctions? It will not be the administrative services and the Government, but the coloured people who happen to support the view held by many hon. Members here. They will be the first people to suffer. I am not sure that hon. Members, who claim that the way to achieve our purpose is to introduce more and more forceful sanctions against South Africa, are not keener to justify their own political viewpoint than to help the people whom they think we should help.

Mr. Stonehouse: Surely the hon. Member has completely misunderstood the position? He must know that the people in South Africa have asked us to take this action because they prefer temporary starvation to permanent slavery.

Mr. Bennett: The hon. Gentleman made that point in his speech. He must have met different South Africans from those whom I met. The leader of the United Party who came here made clear

that he did not want this action to be taken. The spokesman of the Progressive Party who came here—if hon. Members opposite do not think that the United Party is right according to their views—in a series of speeches also made clear that he did not want South Africa to leave the Commonwealth. The hon. Member may have been approached by some who prefer temporary starvation. To me that comes under the heading of smugness—that we in this House should decide how long a period of temporary starvation should last.
I say with complete conviction and considerable feeling that I am glad to welcome this Measure because, whomever else suffers as a result of what I regard as a breakdown of British policy which occurred a short while ago, I desire that the people of this country in South Africa, who bitterly regret they are now outside the Commonwealth, should not be made to suffer.
Earlier on the question of Spain was mentioned. It is not only a question of Spain. In every country where outside attacks are made against the Government the effect is always the opposite to that which is intended. The core of those people who rally round the Government—whether for patriotic reasons or any other reason—is always strengthened by attacks from outside.
The proof is there. In the last few days there have been a couple of by-elections in South Africa and Dr. Verwoerd received a higher percentage of votes than he received not only at the last election, but at the time of the plebiscite on whether there should be a monarchy or a republic. There are already signs not of a slackening of the policies we deplore, but of an intensification of them, for the reasons mentioned by hon. Members on this side, that to attack is the surest way to make people who are in doubt rally round their Government.
I end as I began. I deplore apartheid. I also pray that in this House at least we shall not yield to humbug, illogicality or smugness. So I support the Measure, because it gives us a breathing space to minimise the damage flowing from what I shall always regard as a tragic decision affecting the future of the Commonwealth.

9.46 p.m.

Mr. A. Fenner Brockway: I ask the hon. Member for Torqual (Mr. F. M. Bennett) to excuse me if I begin by referring to another matter. I assure him that I shall deal with the points he made, because I regard them as fundamental when dealing with this Measure.
I want, if I may, to have the close attention of the Joint Under-Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations when putting an issue which I regard as the most significant of all those made during the debate. In his speech, the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations made it clear that the Bill was necessary because it is important that we should face the fact that when the Union of South Africa leaves the Commonwealth she will be in a different position from what she was when she was a member. The hon. Member for Somerset, North (Mr. Leather) made the same point.
I hope that the Joint Under-Secretary of State will give importance to this when he replies. The Minister said that there must be a difference in the relationship between South Africa and this country when she leaves the Commonwealth; but he also said that when we appoint our ambassador to the Union of South Africa that ambassador will not necessarily be attached to the Foreign Office. That was an extraordinary statement.
Is there any other country outside the Commonwealth which has an ambassador who is not attached to the Foreign Office? What have the Government in mind? Do they propose to give the Government of the Union of South Africa the status of a country not in the Commonwealth but different from any Government outside the Commonwealth? Do they think that when they appoint an ambassador to represent this country in the Union—and South Africa is outside the Commonwealth—the ambassador is to have some relationship which is different from the relationship of the ambassador of any other country outside the Commonwealth? It is of tremendous importance that the hon. Gentleman should make a clear utterance on this matter if the uncertainty is to be cleared up.
I come now to the fundamental points made by the hon. Member for Torquay.

I raise them because they reflect difficulties which have been urgent in my own mind.
Here we are saying that the Union of South Africa has been excluded from the Commonwealth because it practises apartheid and yet we know that race discrimination has been practised in this country, in British territories in the Commonwealth, in the Empire. We know that it has been in Kenya. It is now in the Rhodesias. We know that it is reflected in the white policy of Australia in immigration. We know it is reflected in Canadian policy towards the West Indies.
When all this is true, have we any right to say that the Union of South Africa should not be in the Commonwealth because it practises discrimination? I agree with the hon. Member for Torquay that we have to be clear on this point if we are not to be guilty of smugness, self-righteousness and hypocrisy.
I put it to the hon. Gentleman, however, that there is one great distinction between the Union of South Africa, on the one hand, and this country, Kenya, the Rhodesias, Australia and Canada, on the other, one great distinction between South Africa and all these territories, and it is this: that in these other territories we are ashamed of the racial discrimination which we are practising. There is no one in this House who will defend the principle of racial discrimination.

Mr. Speaker: Is there not another distinction conceivably, that the Bill is about South Africa but none of the others? I allowed the hon. Member to go on because he was talking about smugness, which might relate to almost any matter before the House, but I think that there is a difficulty about order.

Mr. Brockway: All right, Mr. Speaker. I will be very brief about it and use it as an illustration.
The hon. Member was saying that we must not be guilty of smugness, and I am answering by saying that when discrimination is practised in other countries we are ashamed of it; but in South Africa it is their root philosophy, it is their religion, it is the whole basis of their life. It is fundamental to their whole system of civilisation. It is because of that that we have the right to say there is a difference between the


Union of South Africa and the other countries to which the hon. Member referred.
The second point which I want to mention is the argument of the hon. Gentleman that we have no right to urge policies which will affect the people of the Union of South Africa, that will hurt them, and that, if we do, again we shall be guilty of humbug. When my hon. Friend the Member for Wednesbury (Mr. Stonebouse) rose and said that the people of South Africa themselves had asked that these policies should be applied against the Union Government, the hon. Member answered that he had spoken to the leader of the United Party, that he had spoken to a member of the Progressive Party, and that they had both denied this fact.
Does the hon. Member really believe that the leader of the United Party, that a member of the Progressive Party, represent those people in South Africa who will suffer most by these kinds of policies? Of course not. Those who will suffer most are the Africans, the Asians and the Coloureds, and it is their representatives, in organisations which are now becoming strong in the Union of South Africa, who are saying, "Our opposition to the humiliation of slavery and apartheid is so great that we would prefer to suffer as the result of your policy than to have our Government maintained in office by kindness and ease towards them". That is the answer to the noble Lord the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke), who is muttering in his corner opposite.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: Produce the evidence.

Mr. Brockway: We have no right to urge policies which mean suffering on others, unless those people themselves say to us, "We want those policies carried out because we believe that they are the best way of destroying apartheid." But that is what they are doing.

Mr. Bennett: Since the hon. Gentleman has several times referred to me, may I tell him that my silence is due to restraint, and not because I am convinced by his counter-argument.

Mr. Brockway: I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman for that statement.
The Union of South Africa and this country have had a very close policy in relation to defence and the Minister, in opening the debate, made some reference to that. I therefore want to ask the Under-Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations what is to happen to defence agreements? What will happen to the agreements that were reached in the exchange of letters in 1955? There is another agreement under which we trained paratroops from South Africa in this country. Are they to act against their own people? And what about the Saracens and other armaments which have been used against the people of the Union?
I am asking the Government not merely to be satisfied with the standstill arrangements for twelve months—which I consider to be much too long for these negotiations—but to make it perfectly clear that when South Africa is excluded from the Commonwealth we will pursue policies which will make clear to the Union Government the hatred of the system of apartheid Which is felt by every hon. Member in the House.

9.58 p.m.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: One of the things that is so fascinating about speeches made in the House is that many of them are not remembered by their colleagues for more than five minutes after they are made.
I was fortunate the other day to be called to speak in the South Africa debate and I am glad today to be able to reiterate to the hon. Gentleman the Member for Eton and Slough (Mr. Brockway) a flat contradiction to his claim that people in South Africa who are passing resolutions and imploring the rest of the world to put down sanctions against their country are willing to suffer the consequences of that action.
The leaders of the Cape Coloured community on, I believe, 19th October, 1960, when I was sitting with them, asked me to go back to this country and tell the leaders of the Labour Party, and people like the hon. Member for Eton and Slough, that it was they and their like who were suffering from the consequences of the trade boycott organised last year. If the hon. Member can produce the evidence of other associations of people and give it to us some time or


place it in the Library of the House we will the more readily believe his rhetorical claims.

Mr. Brockway: Is the noble Lord unaware that the South African National Congress and the South African Asian Congress both endorse this view?

It being Ten o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.

Proceedings on the Republic of South Africa (Temporary Provisions) Bill exempted, at this day's Sitting, from the provisions of Standing Order No. 1 (Sittings of the House), for One Hour after Ten o'clock.—[Mr. Maclay.]

Question again proposed, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: If I may be allowed to say one or two words about the past—and I think that on a Bill like this it is not very attractive to go over old ground and think of what might have been; we have to look forward to the future—I ventured to suggest to the people of South Africa, in an interview that I gave in South Africa last year, that much their best policy for remaining in the Commonwealth was to stay put and sit it out and make no application for renewed membership on their becoming a Republic.
The mistake that Dr. Verwoerd made was that he was too zealous and too eager to be good. He sent messages to this country about that time, and followed them up with his presence here at the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference, eagerly beseeching this country to stand up in its power and its winning way and do the necessary thing for him. He thought that the Prime Minister could work a magic. This country has been thinking for a very long time that anything the Prime Minister does works a magic. It did not happen on this occasion, and Dr. Verwoerd was disappointed.
If South Africa had simply become a Republic, and stayed put, it would have necessitated the organisation of a Commonwealth conference to chuck her out. That conference could never have been organised and South Africa today, if she had acted in that way, could quite happily still be a Republic and a member of the Commonwealth. There

is a precedent for that. It is not exactly on the line of race relations, but it is on the line of democracy, and I would tell my hon. Friend the Member for Somerset, North (Mr. Leather) that not being a democracy is just as good a reason as discriminatory race relations for censure inside the Commonwealth.
I think that it was in October, 1958, that Pakistan abrogated its democratic constitution and declared for a military dictatorship. Was a Commonwealth conference of Prime Ministers summoned for this one? It was a fairly wretched thing to do, one would have thought, to go against the British concept of democracy, public representation, fair play and the redress of grievances and to suppress the franchise entirely. There was not the slightest attempt to call a Commonwealth Prime Ministers' conference for this event, and when the Prime Ministers did assemble, in 1960, not one word was said of censure or even of question of the action of General Ayub Khan in having suspended the Pakistan Constitution.
I think that if he had not been quite so zealous and quite such a good boy and quite so keen to observe the niceties of the game and play his rôle in a proper manner, if he had been more ruthless and more harsh than he was, Dr. Verwoerd might have consulted this precedent. And how much more sensible it might have been for him if he had desisted from coming to Britain and had obliged some of these censorious Prime Ministers from different parts of the world to come together and turn him out.
That is all I want to say about the past. The past is past. Enough is enough. As my hon. Friend the Member for Yarmouth (Mr. Fell) said in a fine speech this evening, a great injury has been done to the unity of the Commonwealth. I say again that I believe that the Prime Minister has failed the Commonwealth on this occasion through ineptitude, through lack of foresight, through lack of percipient planning and through lack of energy, and I am sure that he regrets the situation into which we have now fallen just as profoundly as the House does.
I welcome the terms of the Bill. Contrary to what has been said from the other side of the House, I hope that it


will be allowed to remain law for just as long as is necessary to keep our relations with South Africa as happy and as well regulated as they can be. I do not think that this Measure should be done away with within a short time, and followed, as hon. Members opposite have suggested, by other, direr measures to institute punishments and retribution for South Africa, but that, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State indicated today, it will be made law and will be used for the time necessary to get the regulations made for the easement of our trade, the easement of the rights of citizens, and so on.
On the subject of the High Commissioner's office, I gather from my right hon. Friend that the intention is to have two persons in one; that is to say, Sir John Maud as ambassador to South Africa and Sir John Maud as High Commissioner of the High Commission Territories. My right hon. Friend perhaps did not go as far as that—he put it in more general terms—but I take it that that is the Government's trend of thinking. If that is what is to transpire, I welcome it. It will divide the personality, but it will not weaken the structure. If Sir John Maud is capable of looking after these two great problems now, he can continue to look after them although one of his names has been changed.
I should like finally to try to explore again with the House one of the thoughts I let slip in the concluding parts of my speech on our previous debate on this great subject of South Africa. These High Commission Territories are exceedingly important to the salvation of South Africa; they are also exceedingly dangerous to Britain. There they are—or two of them—implanted, embedded inside South African territory.
The genius of Britain should rise to this opportunity. Those Territories can be used as a catalyst to work a political result. If we handle the thing cleverly, if we retain control over them as we have in the past and yet invite South African capital into them, and try to marry, not the vicious repressive ideas of apartheid but the positive ideas to our position in these Territories, I think that we shall achieve something that will redound to the credit of our two countries.
We are told that Dr. Verwoerd is to spend £15 million a year on industrialising the Native Reserves. That is the good side of his policy of apartheid. It is a tremendously complicated scheme. When one listens to him describing it, as I was privileged to do last October, and goes over it with maps and plans and drawings on great sheets of white paper, one finds its almost incredible economic nonsense—I do not hesitate to say that—but it could be made to work if South African capital of this order—far surpassing anything the poor British taxpayer is able to put into those High Commission territories—were to be lodged there, and used to develop the way of life of the citizens of those High Commission Territories.
I hope that the Government will not now simply resile from their opportunities and their duties in South Africa and sit back and say, "They have never had it so bad". I hope that the Prime Minister will take it upon himself to overcome the disadvantages of the course upon which he has been set and that he will think positively and constructively about the future harmony of our relationship with South Africa.
Where does the Commonwealth go? It is wonderful to feel that new nations are aspiring to membership, but that is a change in its structure. It is not growth. It is not expansion. It is a successful change. We all welcome it. But to see a great territory leave it—
If a Clod be washed away by the Sea, Europe is the lesse…. And, therefore, never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
When a great territory leaves the Commonwealth because of the ineptitude of its members, the feeling that they cannot rise to the occasion, cannot forgive the sins sufficiently to keep the Commonwealth together, then those sins that they cannot forgive in one are transmitted to others and the doctrine of frangibility is erected.
I hope that my right hon. Friends will struggle with all their power to invent new theories for reattaching South Africa to the Commonwealth and, in the process, bring peace to this great territory in which we are the leading nation and advance the prosperity and the civilisation of the depressed Africans who are now under the yoke of the apartheid policy.

10.13 p.m.

Mr. G. M. Thomson: I think that there was a certain symbolism in the fact that the Secretary of State was unable to stay with us tonight to finish off this first stage in South Africa's withdrawal from the Commonwealth because he had to fly off to welcome Sierra Leone as the latest black African member of the Commonwealth. We on this side of the House particularly wish him a good journey on that mission, and we gladly excuse his absence from the House for that purpose, but we do not in the least excuse the perfunctory way in which he introduced this very important and, indeed, historic Bill to the House this evening.
The hon. Member for Yarmouth (Mr. Fell) complained, in a very vicious attack on the Secretary of State, that he did not in the least understand what the Commonwealth was all about, because he had once proposed a world police force. I do not think that the hon. Member for Yarmouth could have studied the communiqué on world disarmament, which was one of the most notable achievements of the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference, because that communiqué was urging on behalf of 600 million people from all races of the world precisely that we ought to move towards some form of world authority following the ideas put forward by the Secretary of State. I must confess that the thought occurred to me that if the present Secretary of State for Commonwealth relations had come into the House to announce the achievement of his goal of a world police force, he would have done it in ten minutes and have said that it presented some interesting legalistic problems but he could not tell the House very much more about it for a very long time yet.
His approach to these problems did less than justice to the desire that is shared on both sides of the House for information on this complicated matter. As the House will have realised by this time, we on this side are prepared to accept the need for a standstill period between South Africa and ourselves while these complex consequences of the Union's withdrawal from the Commonwealth are worked out. But, as the speeches of many of my hon. Friends will have shown, we approach the period

of a year with a good deal of reluctance and caution. It seems to us to be an unduly long period, and we are afraid that the continuance of the status quo for too many months may blunt the sharp edge, and I think the healthy edge, of the international impact made by South Africa's exclusion from the Commonwealth.
I must say that our caution about this period of a year deepens at times into suspicion, and even distrust, as we listen to the kind of speeches that we have heard tonight from the back bench Members of the Conservative Party. They were speeches that were similar to those that were made in the earlier debate on this subject on 22nd March. The hon. Member for Yarmouth was quite typical of the attitude of many back bench Conservative Members when he called this a miserable little Bill. These speeches were a sharp reminder to us, and I have no doubt an equally sharp reminder to the Secretary of State and the Joint Under-Secretary, that in fact the majority opinion in this Parliament on how to deal with these very fateful issues of Africa consists of the Opposition in this House, of the Government Front Bench and perhaps half of their own supporters if there were a free vote on this issue.
Indeed, if one were to judge by the speeches which were made, the overwhelming majority of the Conservative Members are, in fact, against the Government. Out of about nine speeches from the Government benches which to varying degrees have been against the kind of policies that the Government have pursued on the issue of South Africa, only one speech—a remarkable and I would say a very good speech, that of the hon. Member for Somerset, North (Mr. Leather)—was in support of the Government. So they will understand our suspicions about this matter.
We have no wish to act in any sort of vindictive manner towards South Africa in facing these problems, and I must say that I thought the attack which was made by the hon. Member for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison) on my right hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough, East (Mr. Marquand) for being vindictive in his speech was singularly misplaced. Anybody who has attended our debates on Commonwealth affairs over the past few years will know that nobody in this House


according to his own lights has struggled harder to try to change South Africa's policies and opinions in such a way that will allow South Africa to go on as a full member of the Commonwealth.
We are anxious to act in such a way that we will encourage an anti-apartheid majority, because the majority of people in South Africa are against apartheid in their struggles for justice. We are anxious to see the Government's policies carried out in such a way that they will press the South African Government to change their attitude on these matters. When the majority opinion in the Union of South Africa has finally won, as win it will one day, we want it to be easy for a changed South African Government to return to the Commonwealth.
We agree with the views expressed by the Secretary of State at the beginning of this debate that he is, in fact, expressing the view of the majority in the Union of South Africa against apartheid when he states that it must be made clear to the world at large that when a country leaves the commonwealth its position is changed in relation to the members of the Commonwealth. We hope that in the negotiations and discussions about this matter in the months ahead the Secretary of State will stick firmly to that point of view. We hope that he will resist the pressures of his own back benchers with the same unbending obstinacy with which we became so familiar when he was steering the steel denationalisation Measure through the House.
Dr. Verwoerd's tactics seem to us to be to try to pretend that nothing has really changed between South Africa and the white members of the Commonwealth, despite the decision of the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference. Dr. Verwoerd appears to want to try to say that, although he may have been forced formally to leave the new, multiracial Commonwealth, he still hopes informally and quietly and on an ad hoc basis to recreate the old white Commonwealth. It is clear that that enjoys a good deal of influential support in the Conservative Party, but Britain cannot afford to be a party to any such tactics, and the Government know that perfectly well.
We must not only have a different relationship with South Africa in future,

but be seen to have a different relationship. It was because South Africa's domestic policies of apartheid became a great international issue that she had to leave the Commonwealth, and for that very reason it is important that Britain should be seen by the rest of the Commonwealth and the world, as by the people of South Africa, to stand in a different relation to her now that her Government have placed her outside the Commonwealth and also in the unique and pathetic position of isolation from the rest of the civilised world. There is a common concern for those of all races in South Africa who do not share the views of the present ruling group, and it is no service to those people in South Africa to play Dr. Verwoerd's game.
What the British Government do here will strongly influence the other members of the Commonwealth, and I ask the Under-Secretary to tell the House whether there has been consultation with other members of the Commonwealth about the period of twelve months laid down in the Bill. I want him to give an assurance to the House that there will be close consultation with the other members of the Commonwealth about the course of negotiations with the Union of South Africa during the standstill period, however long it may last—and we hope that it will be as short as possible.
The matters to be negotiated between Her Majesty's Government and the Government of the Union of South Africa are many and complicated, and some of them are singularly obscure. Will the Government try to assist the House and the country in forming opinions about the way in which the problems ought to be handled by setting out in a White Paper the factual position of the various matters which lie between us and the Union of South Africa. The present network of agreements is singularly difficult to trace for the ordinary layman.
One of the most important aspects of these problems, as many hon. Members have said, is that of our responsibilities for the High Commission Territories. The consequences of South Africa's exclusion from the Commonwealth would be a lot simpler and more clear-cut if there were no Protectorates, and it would be a good deal easier for us to bring effective pressure on the South


African Government to change its own policies if we did not have to bear those responsibilities in mind. As the hon. Baronet told us, Basutoland, for instance, in effect is a little West Berlin in the middle of South African territory.

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: I am not a baronet. I wish I were, for I could then stay in this House.

Mr. Thomson: As the noble Lord said, Basutoland is an island in the middle of South African territory. Indeed, in some ways its position is worse than that of West Berlin, because a very large proportion of its working population has to go out of Basutoland into the Union in order to seek a livelihood. According to the Morse Report, last year 43 per cent. of the able-bodied men in Basutoland abtained their employment in the Union.
On the other hand, South Africa needs these Basuto workers very much, and it is worth remembering that South Africa's departure from the Commonwealth makes Britain a great deal freer to give the interests of the High Commission Territories absolute priority instead of subordinating them, as we have so often done, to the need to be nice to Dr. Verwoerd and to try to keep him in the Commonwealth. In any case, the most important thing which we can do for these Territories requires no negotiation with the Union of South Africa at all; it is the implementation of the recommendations of the Morse Report. The noble Lord said that the South African Government proposed to spend £15 million a year in their native reserves. It is a disgrace that this country has taken more than a year and still has not reached a decision whether we ought to spend rather less than £7 million over ten years on carrying out the recommendations of the Morse Report.
There is a great deal of ignorance in this country of the tremendous economic, social and educational needs of these High Commission Territories, and we can take no pride in our record there in social welfare, compared with what has been done by the Union Government. In passing, I suggest that the Government should consider, in this very difficult period, when there must be much anxiety in the High Commission Territories, whether the House of Commons

should send a Parliamentary delegation to these Territories to study these matters at first hand and to help to inform opinion in the House on the best way to deal with these difficult problems during our future relationship with the Union of South Africa.
As a number of hon. Members have pointed out, this raises what we are to do about what is at present the High Commission Office in the Union of South Africa. We were astonished by the Secretary of State's remark that the fact that the High Commissioner was to become, in his diplomatic aspects, an ambassador did not necessarily mean that he was to be responsible to the Foreign Office and not to the Commonwealth Relations Office. I hope that in his reply the Under-Secretary of State will clear this up here and now, because it would lead to world-wide misunderstanding if the High Commissioner were simply to be given another label but were still to operate under the Commonwealth Relations Office after South Africa had left the Commonwealth.
Turning to the administration of the High Commission Territories and their economic development, there is a good deal of evidence that, apart from other objections to it, the High Commission Office in the Union of South Africa has been a very cumbersome fifth wheel to the coach. There is a great deal to be said for handing over the High Commission Territories to the responsibility of the Colonial Office and for having individual Colonial Governors in each of these High Commission Territories and then for exercising co-ordination between territories which are very different in their character through some sort of establishment similar to the East African High Commission. I put that to the Government in their consideration of these problems in the months that lie ahead.
A wide range of issues require to be dealt with during the standstill period, including defence, trade and nationality; and all these have been dealt with by one hon. Member or another. The hon. Member for Chigwell laid great emphasis on his belief that we should continue unchanged our defence arrangements with the Union of South Africa. I press on the Government that in reconsidering our defence arrangements we should avoid in future


giving to the South African Government any of the kinds of arms or training facilities which are more likely to be used against the civil population than to be part of any collective defence arrangements against external aggression. It would be disastrous to our reputation if our arms were used in some future Sharpeville, which we hope will not occur but which may easily be provoked by the race policies of the South African Government.
On the nationality question, I endorse the plea made by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mrs. Castle) that we should make arrangements that South African citizens coming to this country or coming into our Colonial Territories and wishing to become citizens of Britain should be free to do so on the surrender of their South African citizenship. It is very important that in the months ahead, which may see a great deal of political persecution, we should make proper arrangements to offer not only asylum but citizenship to those from the Union of South Africa who seek our help. On many of the issues that the Government will have to negotiate about they may find that it is easier to come to a written agreement on things which the Union of South Africa is wanting than on the kind of assurances we shall be seeking about the future safety and welfare of the High Commission Territories.
I urge on the Government that any commitments they may consider making should be as flexible as possible to make it easier for them to be changed in the light of the way in which the policies of the South African Government develop. I have in mind that before the Prime Ministers' Conference the South African Government dropped their censorship Bill in order, I think, partly to give a more pleasing picture of themselves to the world. It might very well be that the South African Government may behave rather differently and better during the period when they are in negotiation with Her Majesty's Government than when the negotiations have concluded.
We do not object to the Bill in principle, but we have doubts about the time factor and we feel that we need more information on the facts. Our attitude to its intentions and our attitude in Committee next week are bound to

depend on the kind of answers we have from the Minister tonight. I have deliberately left him a great deal of time so that he will have no reason for not giving very full answers to the many questions which have been raised.
I ask him to bear in mind in his general approach to this problem that although this is a complicated legal problem it is a great deal more than that. In the way in which the Government handle this matter, and in the wisdom which the Government bring to bear positive pressure on the Union of South Africa in the years ahead, lies the possibility, as my hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn said, of bringing about peaceful change in the Union of South Africa and creating a non-racial society without terrible incidents like Sharpeville. Great responsibility lies on the shoulders of the Government in going into these negotiations. I hope that when the Under-Secretary replies we shall get much more than the kind of legalistic introduction we had, regrettably, from the Secretary of State.

10.34 p.m.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations (Mr. Bernard Braine): In one sense this debate has been unique. Apart from the views expressed by more than one speaker on the length of the stand-still period, almost everything said in the course of the debate lies outside the scope of the Bill. I make no complaint on that score, because it is only natural that deep-felt anxieties about our future relations with South Africa should find expression, that some impatience should be sounded and certain assurances sought.
Nevertheless, it is not only our relations with the Union of South Africa that we have to consider. As the hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. G. M. Thomson) reminded us, we have very great responsibilities for the three High Commission Territories and, since they are linked economically with the Union, we have to be very careful indeed to see that their interests are safeguarded in every way. Because of this and because we stand at the beginning and not at the middle or the end of discussion of the many complex problems involved with the Union Government—and with our Commonwealth partners,


too—I am sure that the House will not expect me to answer in detail all the points which have been raised. Some hon. Members have been urging me to make the right speech in the wrong debate, but I must resist their blandishments. I shall do my best, however, to answer as many of the points which have been raised as I can.
The right hon. Member for Middlesbrough, East (Mr. Marquand) wondered why so long a period as twelve months was being provided for in the Bill. The hon. Member for Dundee, East thought that it was an unduly long period. As my right hon. Friend the Commonwealth Secretary made plain, we need time in which to work out the future pattern of our relationships with South Africa, to hold discussions on many complex subjects with the Union Government and to take the necessary legislative or other action. We judge twelve months to be adequate for this purpose. I am sure that, on reflection, the whole House would agree that it would be foolish if, by fixing a shorter standstill period than we had thought necessary, we found ourselves, at the end of it, having to introduce further legislation to provide for its extension. In this context, we should do well to remember Tennyson's warning against
raw haste, half-sister to delay.
On the other hand, as my right hon. Friend said, the Bill does not prevent us from taking early action if we are ready to do so. The twelve-month period is the maximum. The House may be assured that we shall move as quickly as circumstances and the safeguarding of our essential interests permits. The right hon. Member for Middlesbrough, East referred to Press reports that discussions with the Union Government would not begin until September. That is not so. Negotiations will be conducted through the usual diplomatic channels, and as soon as we decide our policy here on the many questions involved the matter will be discussed with the South Africans, either through our Ambassador in Capetown, or through the South African Ambassador here in London. Some of these questions will be ripe for discussion long before September, and others will take a little longer.
The right hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Glenvil Hall) asked whether the House would have an opportunity to discuss what is ultimately decided in regard to the future pattern of relationships. Since all the matters covered by the Bill are governed by United Kingdom legislation, any amendment will be debated by Parliament, and any other matters in the nature of agreements between ourselves and the South African Government will be dealt with in the normal way. The House, consequently, will be given an opportunity of considering these matters at the appropriate time.

Mr. Glenvil Hall: I am sure that the hon. Gentleman realises the point I was trying to make: that once an agreement has been reached with another Government it is very difficult to upset it. Although I gathered that it would be possible for this House to discuss it, the argument would be that after long negotiations we had come to that settlement, and we must not touch it.

Mr. Braine: I understand the point. But there is no difference between this situation and any other international agreement into which Her Majesty's Government may enter.
I understand that parallel action is being taken by the South Africans. Their Minister for External Affairs, Mr. Louw, told the Union Parliament on 17th April that his Government were contemplating similar action to the Bill before this House.
The hon. Member for Dundee, East asked about consultations with other Commonwealth countries. Commonwealth Governments affected by South Africa leaving the Commonwealth will be making their own arrangements. Each will decide for itself how it will treat South Africa once that country is outside the Commonwealth. There could be no question of a uniform approach since the nature and extent of the existing relations between Commonwealth countries and South Africa varies widely. Some have closer relations than others. We, of course, have the closest and most complex relations of all. I have no doubt that the various Commonwealth Governments will consider their position, although, as with ourselves, they will need time to reach


their conclusions. In regard to matters of mutual interest and concern, the ordinary processes of Commonwealth consultation will certainly be used.
The hon. Member for Wednesbury (Mr. Stonehouse) asked how the Bill affected the future of the High Commission Territories. Neither the Bill nor South Africa's withdrawal from the Commonwealth will affect our relations with the High Commission Territories and our responsibilities to the people who live there, whose loyalty and devotion to the Crown are well known.
I am not sure who implied this, but it is not correct that the interests of the territories have been subordinated by the Government to the maintaining of good relations with the Union. We shall further the interests of the territories in the future as we have done in the past.
Two interesting views were expressed about the decision that our High Commissioner should become an ambassador. On the one hand, the hon. Member for Eton and Slough (Mr. Brockway) was filled with great alarm. On the other hand, my noble Friend the Member for Dorset, South (Viscount Hinchingbrooke), who paid a well-deserved tribute to our distinguished High Commissioner, thought that as the latter had worn two hats so efficiently for so long he should go on doing so. This is a matter on which we have not reached a final conclusion. It is one which we will have to consider carefully. For the time being the two offices will be held by the same person.

Mr. G. M. Thomson: Can the hon. Gentleman make this clear? When the High Commissioner becomes an ambassador, as we understand he will shortly, will he then be responsible to the Foreign Office, or to the Commonwealth Relations Office?

Mr. Braine: I would have thought to the Commonwealth Relations Office, but I would prefer not to add anything to what I have already said. In fact, he becomes ambassador under these arrangements on 31st May of this year, but the Bill provides for a standstill period up to 31st May, 1962. There is plenty of time to enter into an arrangement which will effectively safeguard our interests and make for good adminis-

tration in the territory. I do not think that heavy weather need be made of this. The views expressed on this subject, as on others, have been carefully noted, and I do not think that I can go further tonight.
The hon. Member for Dundee, East suggested that Ministerial responsibility for the High Commission Territories might with advantage be transferred to the Colonial Office. I understand the reason why he makes that suggestion. It is one which we shall consider, but in the months ahead we need to examine the best arrangements which can be made in the interests of the territories and in the interests of the people who live there. In the same way as responsibility for the conduct of relations with South Africa will remain with my right hon. Friend, so will his responsibility for the High Commission Territories. My right hon. Friend has asked me to say that he will let the House know what arrangements we propose when a decision has been taken on this subject.
The question of the administrative arrangements in regard to the capital of the Bechuanaland Protectorate—as the House knows, Mafeking is outside the Protectorate—is a matter which is exercising our thoughts, but it is not one which can be swiftly or easily resolved. It is not a matter of moving an administrative headquarters from one town to another. It is a question of building a new town and making the necessary provision for houses, offices, attendant services, and, most important in a dry and arid country, for water.
I was pressed to say something about the Morse Report. This is going wide of the Bill, but I fully appreciate the views which have been expressed. All I can say here is that we have our responsibilities for the economic development of the territories, whether South Africa is in the Commonwealth or outside it, or whether the Bill becomes law or not. As hon. Members know, we are actively considering what needs to be done and are taking full account of the recommendations of the Morse Report.
I should like to turn now to the question of economic links now and in the future. A number of hon. Members referred to this. We are closely linked to South Africa by trade. We share


preferential advantages. We are both members of the same currency area. None of these arrangements are affected by the Bill.
The hon. Lady the Member for Blackburn (Mrs. Castle), speaking with great fire and passion, told us that she wished to increase the economic pressures on South Africa. I gather from that that she would not mind if preferential arrangements ceased, and if trade between our two countries diminished. All I can say is that I prefer the wise guidance of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister who, speaking to the South African Parliament on 3rd February, 1960, said:
I certainly do not believe in refusing to trade with people because you may happen to dislike the way in which they manage their internal affairs at home.
There is great wisdom in that.
I was very glad to note, as, I am sure, most hon. Members were, that the Leader of the Opposition, speaking in the debate on 22nd March, made it quite plain that he was not in favour of economic sanctions being applied. I was very glad, also, to hear the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Middlesbrough, East declare his support today for that sensible view.
I should like to go into this question of preferences. It should be said—it appears to have been forgotten by some—that preferences are reciprocal, and that about half South Africa's exports to the United Kingdom, other than gold and uranium, enjoy preferences in this country and most of them are guaranteed under the bilateral agreement concluded after the Ottawa Conference in 1932. About 20 per cent. of our exports enjoy preferences guaranteed under the same Agreement. It should also be said, in this context that we share preferences with countries outside the Commonwealth. We should not lightly cast aside advantages of this kind. But what precise form these arrangements may take in the future is a matter for negotiation.

Mr. Marquand: Are there any South African products which enjoy the privilege of free entry into this country? Are there any United Kindom products which enjoy the privilege of free entry into South Africa?

Mr. Braine: I cannot answer that "off the cuff", although there are, of course,

a number of South African products which do enter this country duty free.
But there are advantages on both sides, and I am certain that the interests of our two countries are not served by severing or weakening established trade ties. This does not concern only Governments. This concerns ordinary people. As has been so rightly said in the debate by some of my hon. Friends on this side of the House, many of the people whom hon. Members on that side are so anxious to help would be disadvantaged, perhaps injured; their whole future prospects might be adversely affected by such a course. I am not saying for one moment—and the House must not read anything to the contrary in what I say—that these arrangements will necessarily continue in their present form for all time. All I am saying is that we have carefully to consider the balance of advantage and disadvantage; we have to consider carefully the position we want in the future. This is another reason why we should not be precipitate in our decisions.

Mrs. Castle: Is it not a matter which should be discussed with other members of the Commonwealth, who are vitally linked in this whole question of Commonwealth Preference?

Mr. Braine: These are bilateral arrangements between our two countries. Other members of the Commonwealth have their own arrangements with South Africa, and no doubt will be considering in the months ahead what they propose to do about them, and there will be close consultation between all the Governments concerned.
The hon. Lady made reference to the Commonwealth Sugar Agreement. The matter was not quite so simple as, I think, she suggested. This Agreement is a commercial contract between the United Kingdom Government and the sugar industries in certain Commonwealth countries, and the South African Sugar Association is a party to the Agreement, and exports an agreed quota to our market at a negotiated price.
Swaziland also produces sugar but is not a party to the Agreement and has not a separate quota of her own. At the moment, however, there are arrangements under which Swaziland sugar up to a certain ceiling in quantity can be


sold to the South African market where it receives a proportionate benefit from the export price. We are considering, therefore, what effect the departure from the Commonwealth of South Africa has upon her membership of the Agreement. I do not feel able to say anything more about this at the moment, but I can assure the House that in considering what has to be done we shall pay full regard to the interests of Swaziland, which remains in the Commonwealth, and the sugar producers there.
The right hon. Member for Middlesbrough, East asked whether the Customs Agreement of 1910 was much affected by the Bill, and also asked what benefits it had conferred on the High Commission Territories. It is not affected in any way by South Africa becoming a Republic or leaving the Commonwealth, nor is it affected by the Bill. It is an agreement by which the three territories and South Africa have, for the last fifty years, formed a single Customs Union, and by which the territories gain a share of Customs duties, which makes a very substantial contribution to their revenues—

Mr. G. M. Thomson: But will the hon. Gentleman bear in mind that that share appears to vary between 0·1 per cent. and 0·8 per cent., depending on the territory, and that the Agreement does not appear to have been revised since 1910? In the interests of the territories, will he make sure that, as part of the negotiations, the Agreement is revised?

Mr. Braine: I will bear very much in mind what the hon. Gentleman says, but one can, of course, use figures to prove almost anything. I repeat that, at the moment, the three territories derive substantial benefit from the existence of the Customs Union, and if the Agreement did not exist the effect would be that each territory would have to maintain its own Customs services over very long land frontiers. There are obvious disadvantages in this, but it is clear that in the months ahead we shall have to examine the whole situation.
The right hon. Gentleman asked about two further important matters—defence and citizenship. He asked what defence agreements were in existence, and what was to happen. I would remind him of the Simonstown Agreement of June, 1955, which provided that the facilities

of the Simonstown naval base would be available to the Royal Navy in peace and to the Royal Navy and to our Allies' navies in any war in which the United Kingdom was involved. This Agreement is not legally affected by the Union leaving the Commonwealth, but we shall consider it, along with other agreements with South Africa, in deciding whether our interests, that is, British interests, require us to propose any alteration.
The hon. Member for Eton and Slough referred to the training of paratroopers. Certain training is provided, of course, in Britain for members of the Armed Forces of the Commonwealth and some foreign countries. That has long been the practice. It may include training in parachute techniques, and in the past this has been done for small numbers of men from the Union. If requests for facilities of this kind are received in future from South Africa, they will have to be considered very carefully in the light of prevailing circumstances.
The right hon. Gentleman also asked about citizenship during the interim period. By Section 6 (1) of the British Nationality Act, 1948, any South African citizen is entitled to be registered as a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies on satisfying my right hon. Friend that he is ordinarily resident in the United Kingdom and has been so resident during the twelve months preceding his application.
The hon. Lady the Member for Blackburn thought that the Bill itself was concerned with the issue of citizenship and nationality. I must make it absolutely plain that this issue is not affected by the Bill. All that the Bill does is to preserve the position for twelve months under Acts of the United Kingdom Parliament which make provision in relation to Her Majesty's Dominions, or describe South Africa by reference to membership of the Commonwealth and which, but for the Bill, would cease to have any application to South Africa after 31st May next.
The relevant United Kingdom statutes governing the question of nationality are the British Nationality Acts of 1948 and 1958. The first of these laid down a new legal definition of the status of British subject. Section 1 (1) of the 1948 Act states that every


person who is a citizen of a country named in the following subsection is a British subject. This subsection simply contains a list of the countries in question, including South Africa, without, however, any reference to membership of the Commonwealth. This will remain the position, even though South Africa leaves the Commonwealth on 31st May, unless and until the Nationality Acts are amended.
Clearly, the matter cannot be left there, and that is what the right hon. Gentleman had in mind. But how we dealt with it obviously requires our most careful thought. The Government feel, and I hope that the House feels too, that it would be quite wrong for us to come to any hurried conclusions about something which is of such deep, personal and intimate concern to so many people. It is precisely because human considerations are involved here that we are considering these issues as thoroughly and as quickly as we possibly can.
There were, of course, criticisms about our attitude in the United Nations. My hon. Friend the Member for Yarmouth (Mr. Fell) thought that it was all our fault. All I can say is that my hon. Friend's conception of what the Commonwealth is or should be is not mine and that it would have been very much better if he had read the speeches made by the Prime Ministers of Canada and New Zealand to their people on their return from the Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference, those of the Prime Ministers of India, Ceylon and Malaya, and of the Presidents of Ghana and Pakistan. He might then have come to the conclusion that if all those are wrong there is not any Commonwealth left for him to defend.
My hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell (Mr. Biggs-Davison) criticised our votes in the United Nations on the ground that they were incompatible with the stand which we had always taken on Article 2 (7) of the Charter.

He made an interesting speech which I followed closely, but there is really no incompatibility. What the critics do not recognise is that the world has changed and circumstances have altered and what may have been sensible and practicable to have done yesterday is not necessarily so today. Our view on this was put with considerable clarity by my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Mr. Smithers), our representative in the Fourth Committee of the United Nations during the apartheid debate, and I would strongly recommend my hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell to read the whole of his speech, because it makes perfectly plain our attitude on this question.
I come finally to the central purpose of the Bill. One simply cannot end a 50-year association overnight or in a few weeks. Indeed, in a very real sense the association is longer because for parts of the Union and for a substantial section of her population it goes back well over a hundred years. I was moved, as I am sure were all hon. Members, by the reference made by my hon. Friend the Member for Chigwell to the South African brigade in the First World War. One cannot view South Africa's departure except with sorrow, but it has happened and now we must make the best we can of the situation. A new relationship must take the place of the old. That is why we feel it right to look at the whole complex pattern of our relations with the people of South Africa before we reach final decisions. The views expressed in the debate will be borne in mind. The Bill will give us time to make such a comprehensive survey and to conclude all the necessary arrangements.

I commend the Bill to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Bill committed to a Committee of the whole House.—[Mr. Peel.]

Committee Tomorrow.

Orders of the Day — IMMUNITIES AND PRIVILEGES

11.0 p.m.

The Joint Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. J. B. Godber): I beg to move,
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (Immunities and Privileges) Order, 1961, be made in the form of the draft laid before this House on 27th March.
This draft Order is necessary to enable Her Majesty's Government to ratify the Convention establishing the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development signed at Paris on 14th December, 1960. When the Convention comes into force, the O.E.C.D. will be set up and will replace the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation. The O.E.C.D. will in fact be the O.E.E.C. remodelled to meet the tasks of the 1960s. The United States and Canada will join the eighteen Western European O.E.E.C. countries as full members of the new organisation.
The aims of the O.E.C.D. will be to promote policies designed to achieve the highest sustainable economic growth and employment in member countries, to contribute to sound economic expansion in member and non-member countries in the process of economic development, and to contribute to the expansion of world trade on a multi-lateral, non-discriminatory basis.
Consultation and co-operation between member Governments will lie at the heart of the work of O.E.C.D., as in its predecessor the O.E.E.C. Like its predecessor, the O.E.C.D. will be an important international organisation. I regret having to burden hon. Members with so many initials.
Supplementary Protocol No. 2 to the O.E.C.D. Convention of 1960 provides for the same privileges and immunities to be accorded in the United Kingdom as were contained in Supplementary Protocol No. 1 to the O.E.E.C. Convention of 1948. Her Majesty's Government are not, therefore, asked to extend more privileges and immunities to O.E.C.D. than were required for O.E.E.C. I would stress that.
The O.E.C.D., like the O.E.E.C., will have its headquarters in Paris. All its meetings will normally be held there.

The present O.E.E.C. has a staff of 931, of whom 178 are British nationals. The numbers are expected to remain about the same when O.E.E.C. becomes O.E.C.D.
The O.E.E.C. has only very rarely held any meetings in London and we expect that this will also be the case with the new body. So far as we can foresee, no O.E.C.D. staff will be stationed in this country. No O.E.E.C. staff are resident in the United Kingdom at present. The Secretary-General, and the senior officials of the organisation, will pay short visits to this country from time to time on official business. I would not expect that more than five or six officials of the organisation would be here at any one time. Normally they will be in Paris. All this means that only a few people at a time will enjoy the privileges and immunities under this Order in the United Kingdom, and that only at infrequent intervals.
The draft Order confers privileges and immunities no greater in extent than those required by the Protocol to the O.E.C.D. Convention or those authorised by the International Organisations (Immunities and Privileges) Act, 1950. It revokes and will replace the existing order referring to the O.E.E.C. The immunities to be enjoyed under it by the organisation itself do not differ from those enjoyed under existing Orders by most other international organisations to which we belong.
Of the international staff, only the three high officers—the Secretary-General and his two deputies—will enjoy a diplomatic scale of privileges and immunities. Although the Protocol did not require it, the 1949 O.E.E.C. Order conferred a diplomatic scale of privileges and immunities on the families of the deputy Secretaries-General. This will not be the case in the new Order.
The remainder of the staff will enjoy only immunity from suit and legal process in respect of their official duties, and exemption from Income Tax on the emoluments they receive from the organisation; that is to say, they will enjoy no more than the necessary immunity to do their jobs as international officials without interference from national authorities. This is


normal in all international organisations. Exemption from taxation is also normal in international organisations, because otherwise the member countries who share the cost of the salaries would be contributing in taxes to the exchequer of the host Government. That is an important point, and I must draw it to the attention of the House.
The Order specifies that only established members of the organisation's staff will get the privileges and immunities. Experts other than regular staff employed on missions for the organisation will continue to enjoy the immunity from jurisdiction in respect of official acts and from personal arrest or detention and seizure of their baggage normally accorded to such persons. Such experts have only occasionally been employed by O.E.E.C. and we would expect that visits to this country by persons in this category employed by O.E.C.D. would be equally rare.
Representatives of member countries to the principal and subsidiary organisations of O.E.C.D., that is to say, the Council and its various Committees, will enjoy a diplomatic scale of privileges and immunities. The occasion of bringing in the present Order has been used to alter the terms of the 1949 O.E.E.C. Order to accord closely in this respect with the terms of the Protocol in the terms of Part II of the Schedule to the 1950 Act. As O.E.C.D. meetings would normally take place in Paris, this section of the Order will apply only occasionally. On the other hand, the permanent United Kingdom delegation to the O.E.C.D. in Paris will benefit from the relevant provisions of the Protocol.
I have tried to explain what is involved in this Order. I stress the fact that this is a replacement of the existing Order in relation to O.E.E.C. and I would suggest, therefore, that we are not in effect expanding the immunities and privileges of which I know this House is always very jealous.
I accordingly ask the House to approve this Order.

11.7 p.m.

Sir Frank Soskice: I do not think that the House would desire to spend very long over this Order, particularly in view of the very clear and full account given of it by the Joint Under-

secretary of State, for which I am sure we are all grateful. Our approach, however, I think would have this in common, wherever we sit in this House, that we would think it wrong to pass it sub silentio. That is because it is an Order which lifts certain persons above the law of this country when they are here enjoying the privileges of this country.
The Minister has pointed out that this Order is in a sense a replacement of a previous Order, and I do not know whether I might have your permission, Mr. Speaker, with a view to saving time, to refer to the present organisation as "C.D." and to the previous one as "E.C.", forgetting the "O.E.". Even the "C.D." is only a replacement for "E.C.". Nevertheless, this is one more of a series of Orders which literally strew our legislation, as the months go by, like falling leaves.
I do not know how many physical persons in this country at the moment may thumb their noses at the law of the country while they are here, but one has the impression that they really are of an immense number. Having said that, and having, as it were, got my grumble off my chest, may I say that I think it is inescapable that we should confer these privileges, I hope in as sparing a manner as we possibly can?
With regard to the actual form and content of the Order, I would ask the Minister, although the Order in itself is necessary, to give some thought to whether we do not go too far in it. It is perfectly permissible, I should have thought, to constitute the organisation a corporate body and give it, as a corporate body, certain privileges as such, but the Order goes on to extend privileges first to "representatives" of the organisation. That, surely, is an extremely wide term. It is very difficult to say who is a representative and who is not. If somebody sends a boy round the corner to get a newspaper, is not he a representative in a sense, and if he rides his bicycle and knocks somebody over in the course of doing so, I suppose he is immune from process? At any rate, the word "representative" would seem to involve that consequence.
One then has a second category, officers, and a third, experts. Those are very wide descriptions of persons within which each of these persons has immunity


from any process in our courts when he is doing anything in the discharge of his official duties. I can well understand that such persons should be immune from any process; in respect of words spoken and should not be subject to slander actions if, in the course of their official duties, they use words defamatory of individuals. We do not like the idea of giving that privilege to anybody, but I suppose that we must.
But it seems somewhat difficult to understand—to go back to the street accident situation—why they should be allowed to drive their motor cars negligently or, as I suggested, ride their bicycles negligently. Is it really necessary that persons should be subject to the risk of being knocked over by negligent drivers without having any redress against them if those persons are driving their cars negligently in the discharge of their duties, in the discharge of their duty of going from one office to another, in the discharge of their duty of going from their home or residence to their office?
I put it to the Under-Secretary of State, as a matter which he should consider when further Orders are brought forward for approval by the House, whether in this respect we do not go too far. We have had a great deal of this, and I am sure that both parties are responsible, and no doubt I have my own responsibility for having proposed this sort of thing many times. Nevertheless, it is never too late to repent and, whatever the precedents which have bedevilled us, at long last we ought to consider whether it is necessary to maintain these privileges at the expense of citizens of this country who might suffer damage, when perfectly innocently going about their lawful occasions, because some representative or officer or expert, whatever the differences among those three categories of persons are, chooses to disregard his obligations as a road user when driving along our streets.
I said, first, that I did not propose to ask the House to spend long on this Order; secondly, that I wanted to grumble and, thirdly, having grumbled, to say that the Order is necessary. I have done all three, and I have made a suggestion which I hope that the Undersecretary of State will bear in mind when he proposes further Orders. I do not know when the next will be, but I suspect that it will be in a few minutes.

11.12 p.m.

Mr. Michael Clark Hutchison: I agree with almost every word that the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice) has said. I have been in the House only four years, but this is the fourth or fifth occasion on which I have been asked to approve an extension of immunities, and I am getting tired of it. I see no reason why these people from abroad should be given special status in this country so that they are above the law which is applicable to the ordinary citizen. It is absolutely wrong and entirely futile, and I wish that the Foreign Office would make a stand against it.
I do not know whether my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State realises that by extending these immunities he is lowering the status of those people to whom the immunities originally applied many years ago—ambassadors. No one other than ambassadors and first secretaries should have any immunity.
I would be very glad if Ministers at the Foreign Office would take up this matter in the United Nations and with their colleagues and opposite numbers abroad, to see whether the whole matter could not be brought into proper perspective and the range of immunities cut down so that we should not be asked to grant any more of these immunities and privileges. I must give warning to my hon. Friend that on future occasions I shall do my best to oppose them and throw them out.

11.15 p.m.

Mr. Godber: May I have the leave of the House to reply to the right hon. and learned Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice) and my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, South (Mr. Clark Hutchison)? I appreciate the right hon. and learned Gentleman's comments and I am somewhat grieved that my hon. Friend feels so disturbed about this Order, particularly as I have pointed out that in this instance we are merely replacing one Order with another and are making no extension, although I may be arguing somewhat differently in a few minutes.
I have always realised the way in which the House regards such Orders, I think rightly, in that we are giving


benefits and privileges and should not do so without the most careful thought; but these matters have been established by international agreement in relation to these international bodies and, whether we like it or not, the world is beset by many more international bodies than we had in the past.
The protocol of the organisation lays down the amount of immunity and privilege which each country should give—and it is not merely a question of this country. As I showed in the figures in my opening remarks, there are a large number of British nationals in this organisation who are stationed permanently in Paris and who will benefit from the arrangement; we should note that fact. We gain more benefit in this instance than we give.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman said that these Orders came like falling leaves. I am surprised that he used such a metaphor at this time of the year. Had he likened them to opening blossoms, that would have been a happier choice of words at this time of the year.

Sir F. Soskice: I said "falling leaves" because that seemed to me to have a connotation of sadness which might express regret on the Minister's part. If he regards them as opening blossoms, I am filled with apprehension, and I am sure that the hon. Member for Edinburgh, South (Mr. Clark Hutchison) shares my feeling.

Mr. Godber: I will not take that point any further. The right hon. and learned Gentleman, speaking of representatives, talked of "sending the office boy round", but in normal cases "representatives" in this sense nearly always means the governmental representatives, who are usually Ministers or Members of Parliament for the countries concerned. I thought that the right hon. and learned Gentleman would be interested in seeing that they were treated as well as the officers. Representatives are usually accorded the higher rate of immunity.
The right hon. and learned Gentleman spoke of officers being involved in a civil suit as a result of their negligence. It should be drawn to his attention that these paragraphs start
Except in so far as in any particular case any immunity or privilege is waived".

I assure him that we should certainly bring pressure to bear, if it were obviously a civil suit, for the privilege and immunity to be waived in such a glaring instance as he mentioned. He will see that those words occur in each paragraph, and it is an important point. I make it as a point of mitigation of a proposal which he said he considers necessary but which the House nevertheless dislikes. I can understand that view and I appreciate it, but I hope that, with that explanation to both the right hon. and learned Gentleman and my hon. Friend, they will allow the Order to be passed.

Mr. Clark Hutchison: Is my hon. Friend aware that I do not want these immunities for British people abroad and I do not want them for foreign people in this country? I should like to know what the Foreign Office intend to do to cut down these proposals in future.

Mr. Godber: I have pointed out that these proposals are governed largely by the protocols of these various agreements. While I naturally take my hon. Friend's point, it has become international practice that there should be certain immunities and privileges. In so far as they relate to taxation, they help to reduce the cost to countries such as Britain, because if salaries were taxed we should have to pay these international civil servants at much higher rates, and these would have to be found eventually by the Government and the other countries concerned. I believe that, as long as there is a proper check on these matters, there is no real harm, and I hope that my hon. Friend will view these Orders in a more kindly way.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (Immunities and Privileges) Order, 1961 be made in the form of the draft laid before this House on 27th March.
To be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of Her Majesty's Household.

11.20 p.m.

Mr. J. B. Godber: I beg to move:
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the European Free Trade Association (Immunities and Privileges) Order, 1961, be made in the form of the draft laid before this House on 27th March.


I am sorry to inflict yet another of these Orders on the House. The Convention establishing the European Free Trade Association is an agreement between its seven members, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Switzerland, Austria, and Portugal, aimed at an expansion of economic activity and an increase in co-operation between them. It provides for the reduction and eventual elimination of the tariffs on industrial goods between member countries.
Article 35 of the Convention, which was signed on 4th January, 1960, provides that a protocol should lay down the privileges and immunities to be granted by member States in connection with the Association. A protocol was accordingly drawn up and signed last July. The scale of immunities was carefully considered in relation both to the precedents existing in the cases of other international organisations and to the provision of what seems necessary to ensure that the effective operation of the European Free Trade Association.
The present Order is required to enable Her Majesty's Government to ratify the protocol of 28th July, 1960, according legal capacity, immunities and privileges to the European Free Trade Association. The protocol came into force as regards Denmark, Norway and Austria on 22nd March, 1961, when, in accordance with Article 21 of the protocol, the third signatory State had deposited its instrument of ratification.
The scale of immunities and privileges conferred under this Order is no different from that already granted to the majority of other international organisations in respect of which Her Majesty's Government have signed a status agreement. The Association has a small secretariat of only about 50 officers, including both professional and subordinate staff, of whom only the Secretary-General enjoys full-scale benefits. If, as is presently the case, the Secretary-General happens to be a citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies, these full-scale benefits will not be accorded. In such circumstances, the status of the Secretary-General varies little from that of the other officers of the Association.
The headquarters of this body is in Geneva. There is to be a Ministerial

meeting in the United Kingdom in June, but such an event is unlikely to recur more, often than once in three years or more. Since, moreover, there is no intention to establish an agency in the United Kingdom, the effects of the Order can hardly be far-reaching.
Those are the facts relating to this Order. I can see, however, from what my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, South (Mr. Clark Hutchison) said, a little time ago, that even this will not satisfy him, because this is rather like the housemaid's baby, a very little one, but in principle he will disapprove. I am sorry that I should be incurring his displeasure again so soon, but I assure him that these matters are subject to international agreement, and it is very difficult for us not to concur in what has become in these post-war years a common form. These international bodies proliferate, it is true, but we must play our part in granting immunities and privileges in the same way as is the custom in other countries.

11.24 p.m.

Sir F. Soskice: I suspected that the Minister would not be able to get away from these Orders for very long and would come back very soon with a second one. I am afraid it is a new blossom which has the same sort of features as the old, and there is the same parade of officers and representatives.
The Minister is very fortunate in that his hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, South (Mr. Clark Hutchison) has already gone. I believe he left before the hon. Gentleman rose to his feet to move this Motion. However, I shall not seek to voice the grievances that his hon. Friend would have voiced, but simply say that the same comments as I made on the last Order apply to this one. I do not think I would be usefully detaining the House if I repeated them.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,
That an humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, praying that the European Free Trade Association (Immunities and Privileges) Order. 1961, be made in the form of the draft laid before this House on 27th March.

To be presented by Privy Councillors or Members of Her Majesty's Household.

Orders of the Day — RAILWAYS (GREAT CENTRAL LINE)

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. E. Wakefield.]

11.25 p.m.

Mr. George Darling: I want to raise a very important matter concerning the curtailing of train services and the closing of stations on the Great Central Railway line between Marylebone and Sheffield and Manchester. I want to show the Joint Parliamentary Secretary, if I can, that the area transport users' consultative committees and the Central Consultative Committee have been persuaded to agree to rather drastic reductions in train services by the use of very questionable figures supplied by British Railways officials. I want him to know that these measures to reduce services are causing considerable hardship and inconvenience to people living in towns on this line or near to it, and to people living in the country who want to use the services that this line used to provide. I hope to show that, far from being a "white elephant", this line, with suitable and well-timed train services, could be made to pay.
I am sure that the Joint Parliamentary Secretary will agree that I have given myself a rather tough assignment to deal with this in the space of fifteen minutes or so, and I hope, therefore, that I shall be forgiven if I stick closely to my rather full notes. I hope to persuade the Joint Parliamentary Secretary and his right hon. Friend that an independent inquiry should be held into the allegations and claims which I shall make, and that this inquiry should advise on the future organisation of this valuable and, as I believe, potentially profitable railway service. Although I shall have to make some rather serious charges, let me say at once that I have a great deal of sympathy for the railway officials concerned. I have been told that one of the officials at a meeting of the railway men got so exasperated that he said that the whole track ought to be torn up. I have some sympathy with that point of view.
The Great Central Line in the present organisation of British Railways is a complete administrative nuisance. It

just does not fit into the regional system which has been set up. For geographical reasons it is placed in the London Midland Region, which appears to be the best place on the map. But the London Midland Region obviously does not want it. Therefore, it is administered by four different sections of British Railways, although it is only a relatively short railway service. The London Midland Region has, so to speak, overall control, but the south, or London, end of the line comes under London Transport—the Harrow stretch—and then it passes to the London Midland Region. I hope that the Joint Parliamentary Secretary will not question these facts, otherwise we shall have to raise the matter again, because they have been carefully considered, as I shall explain in a moment, by the railway men themselves. They ought to know how the railway service is operated. It passes into the London Midland Region and comes under the control of Crewe, and then into the control of Derby, and then passes back beyond Rugby to the Eastern Region and north of Nottingham it comes under the Great Northern traffic manager on the Eastern Region side.
It is this hopeless confusion of management which, in my view, is responsible for all the trouble. None of these regions wants the little bits and pieces of the line which each of them has to operate and control. So, between them, they are proposing to close down, if not all, most of the passenger services, and to restrict the freight services so far as possible, just to get rid of their administrative difficulties.
I appreciate that that is a pretty serious charge to make, but I will go further and say that, to assist them in trying to achieve this unfortunate end, they have presented to the consultative committees facts and figures of train services and passengers carried, and the losses which have been made, which are completely misleading.
I do not want to rely on my own very unfortunate experience on this line. I have plenty of proof without that, and I should like, in support of this, to quote some letters which I have received since I first raised the matter in the House.
The first letter is from a don at Magdalen College, Oxford. He says:
It has been quite obvious during the last few years that the policy of those concerned


with the management of this line has been to take away nearly all the trains and then to say the line isn't paying. Services have been drastically out, no one has bothered about the times of arrival and departure and the 'couldn't care less' attitude of those responsible for the running of the trains has been quite fantastic. I do not make these accusations lightly…The Great Central Line is far superior to the Midland St. Pancras one, and yet the service to London is now so bad that it is virtually impossible to travel on the former.
The next letter comes from a person in Keighley in Yorkshire, who says:
In the old Great Central line the British Railways had a great asset—the most recently constructed main line in England with an excellent record of fast and punctual trains—a line whose connections permitted the running of valuable cross-country trains which enabled awkward journeys to be made in comfort.
I have watched with horror the destruction of services on this line—the policy can only be a deliberate one to drive passengers and freight away so that figures can be triumphantly produced to justify the complete closure of the line.
The next letter comes from a person in Buckinghamshire. He says:
About eighteen months ago I called on the official at Euston Station who is responsible for dealing with the complaints of passengers, and I told him in almost the same words as used by yourself"—
that was when I spoke in a previous debate—
that passengers had been driven off the line by making travel on it almost impossible. Trains had been taken off; connections had been altered so as to be completely inconvenient; services—particularly on Sundays—were changed at short notice with little or no notification, and frequently changed again.
I add that it might appear that the railway authorities were determined to make the line unprofitable so that there could be a case for closing it!
As I think the Joint Parliamentary Secretary will know, those letters are typical of scores which have appeared in the local newspapers in the towns and cities along the line. There are thousands of passengers and potential passengers who are completely convinced that the train services have been deliberately curtailed to present a picture of a declining line with not enough passengers to make the line pay, and that this picture presented by British Railways is quite wrong.
It is not only the passengers who take that view. The railwaymen take it. Recently the district councils of the National Union of Railwaymen, who are representative of the main areas along this line, sent representatives to their

union headquarters in London to discuss the question of this curtailment of Great Central services. This meeting was reported in the Railway Review in the issue of 14th April, and I should like to quote briefly from it.
The report says:
Timetables have been arranged…so that connections have been missed by only a few minutes.
In the view of the representatives, this tended to put people off travelling by train and to be diverted to other services.
It was, therefore, a vicious circle. The railways were not being run to attract passengers. Then, because they were put into the position of being uneconomical to operate, proposals were put forward to withdraw the services.
Those are the views of the railway-men.
The report goes on to say:
It was generally felt, at the end of the meeting, that a case should be made out to show the need for the continuance of the Great Central Line.
I am convinced that such a case can be made out, if it is presented successfully before an inquiry, because there is from passengers and from railway men this unanimous view that, far from proving that the Great Central Line does not pay, the railway officials concerned have only succeeded in throwing doubts on their own case. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary will know—and in view of the time, I am not going to quote it—that these suspicions are voiced in the 1960 Report of the Central Transport Consultative Committee. If I had time I would question many of the statements which appear in the Committee's Report. Some of the statements in present circumstances are—I was going to say not true, but that is going too far; but they do not meet the facts.
I will quote this from paragraph 36 of the Report:
There were comparatively few passengers on the services which were marked down for withdrawal, and those had the alternative of going via the former Midland route from St Pancras.
Those two statements in one sentence are completely at variance with the facts, because few passengers appeared in the figures after the services had been curtailed. I am quite convinced that if the Central Transport Consultative Committee had been given the figure before the services were curtailed, there would


have been a very good case for continuing the train services. As to the point that they had the alternative route, that is not correct. There are only a few sections of the St. Pancras Midland line which give an alternative route to the passengers most seriously affected by the curtailment of the services.
Therefore, I think that a case for a further inquiry—not before the Consultative Committee—can well be made out. I take the view of many railway men and railway officials about this business, and I have not met one anywhere from St. Marylebone to Sheffield who is not convinced that passenger services on this line would pay. They all believe from their own experience that diesel services properly organised and properly timed would pay.
Then, of course, there, is the great question of freight traffic. The Joint Parliamentary Secretary probably knows that about one-tenth of the rail freight traffic starts in south Yorkshire. If we are to increase our industrial production and exports and if we close down the Great Central Line, there will be far worse congestion than is the case now on the Midland and Great Northern lines. There will be transport chaos.
I can give the hon. Gentleman evidence now of coal trains standing for days inside marshalling yards on the Midland Railway and which cannot be moved because they will not use the Great Central alternative route to the South and Southwest. They have tried to kill that line. They want to hold the services on the Great Northern and the London Midland lines from Euston to Manchester and beyond. Because of that they are getting serious congestion on those alternative lines.
Therefore, I would plead with the hon. Gentleman to respond, not so much to the case I have put, but to the thousands of people who have written to the Press, who have sent protests to their Members of Parliament, who have got their local councils to join in this protest in order to keep the Great Central Line open. I am convinced that, if there are services properly timed and properly provided with diesel trains and so on, inter-city services and local services can be made to pay, and if is about time a proper administra-

tion of the line was set up. It can pay only under one management, so to speak, with a proper administrative unit set up to make the line the working and profitable proposition it ought to be.

11.39 p.m.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport (Mr. John Hay): The hon. Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough (Mr. Darling) has raised once more the subject of the transformation of the rôle which the Great Central Line plays in British Railways' affairs. At the very outset, I must point out that what is proposed for the Great Central line by the British Transport Commission is not its closure but its use for a type of traffic different, by and large, from the present type. I think that I can best help the hon. Member and the House if I first give, briefly, the historical background and then say something about the Government's attitude, but I should preface my remarks by once again saying that my right hon. Friend the Minister of Transport has no Ministerial responsibility for the closure of railway lines or the withdrawal of services from railway lines. Still less has he any responsibility for adjustment of the timing of trains, and so on.
The Great Central Line was originally constructed round the turn of the century as an extension to London of the old Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway. It provided a third route to London from the area including Manchester, the West Riding, Sheffield and Nottingham. Under the Railways Act, 1921, which set up the four main line companies, the Great Central Line was absorbed in the London and North Eastern Railway and, until nationalisation in 1948, it remained inside that group.
It was then a competitor with three other lines. It was a competitor with the Great Northern route out of King's Cross, and this was a route also in the London and North Eastern Railway group. It was a competitor with the L.M.S. main line out of St. Pancras. Thirdly, it was a competitor with the L.M.S. main line out of Euston to Rugby and Manchester. I mention this because these three lines are still in existence, and it is an important aspect of the situation that the hon. Member has brought before the House tonight.
Subsequent to nationalisation, the Great Central Line fell, broadly speaking—I will not argue with the hon. Gentleman about the details—into two railway regions. Broadly speaking, the stretch from Marylebone to a point south of Sheffield is in the London Midland Region, and the Sheffield district is in the Eastern Region of British Railways. Both these regions, of course, are part of the unified system of British Railways, and the Great Central Line is integrated in the whole system.
When the Commission decided to rationalise its services, the Great Central Line became an obvious candidate for that type of treatment because as I think that the House will see, the existence of two more or less parallel main routes over 160 miles gave the Commission an opportunity for better planning. The hon. Gentleman shakes his head, but he was in the House at the time and will remember that better planning and greater rationalisation of the railway resources was one of the predominant arguments put forward by the Government he supported for carrying out nationalisation—

Mr. Darling: One does not rationalise by murdering something.

Mr. Hay: I will deal with that in a moment, but I will now give the reasons given by the Commission, not for closing the line—it is not doing that—but for transforming its rôle.
The B.T.C. aims at three objectives. The first is to concentrate freight on the Great Central Line and thereby give greater freedom of movement and better timing to the passenger services on the London Midland main line. The second objective is the withdrawal of the bulk of the passenger facilities on the Great Central Line. I say "the bulk of," not all the facilities, because some passenger facilities will remain. This is estimated by the Commission to save about £140,000 a year—

Mr. Darling: That is queried.

Mr. Hay: I know that it is queried, but this is the only figure of which we have official cognisance in the Ministry of Transport, and the only figure mentioned to us officially by the Transport Users' Consultative Committees.
The third objective of the Commission is to have scope for giving better facili-

ties for parcels traffic. There is in the London-Midland Region a steadily growing parcels traffic. A high proportion of this originates in London, Leicester, Nottingham or Manchester, and all these towns lie on the Great Central route.

Mr. John Farr: Is it not a fact that the most efficient services have been shown to be obtained in the past by intermingling passenger traffic and freight traffic rather than by concentrating on two different types on two different lines?

Mr. Hay: This is a matter of theory for the cognoscenti of railways among whom I do not profess to be included. But the Commission is satisfied that what it is trying to do now will provide a more efficient service for freight, parcels and passengers. This growing parcels traffic in the London-Midland Region means that it can concentrate its parcels traffic on the Great Central Line and largely remove parcels traffic from the other Midland lines. In addition, the Commission is bringing forward better handling facilities for parcels to meet the improved service that can be provided. This is the Commission's case, and it is my job to put it to the House.
The Commission announced its plan concerning the Great Central Line in May, 1959. It consisted of two parts. The first was the withdrawal of day through-expresses from Marylebone to Sheffield, Bradford and Manchester, and their replacement by a reduced semi-fast service. The second was the withdrawal of local services north of Aylesbury.
The first part of the plan was put to no fewer than five transport users' consultative committees in the areas during 1959. The committees approved the proposals and, as is their duty under Statute, they passed their recommendations and minutes to the Central Transport Consultative Committee, which referred to the matter in the Annual Report from which the hon. Member for Hills-borough quoted. I should like to quote part of paragraph 37 on page 12 of that Report, because this is the view of the Central Consultative Committee and it should be before the House. It reads:
The Area Committees concerned were satisfied, however, that the justification for this rationalisation of the old Great Central Line was overwhelming, and that though some users


were considerably inconvenienced, there was no hardship of a degree which could possibly justify rejection of the change.
I would remind the House that this finding of the Committee is in a report by users, not British Railways. The Committee is not some kind of independent body. It is a body of users who, if anybody, one would exject to object to the withdrawal of services.

Mr. Darling: The hon. Gentleman will realise that the transport users' consultative committees and the Central Committee cannot obtain independent information. They have to rely on information supplied to them by the British Transport Commission, and I query the information they have received.

Mr. Hay: I will come to that point. I have now had over two years' experience of these committees and what they do, and I assure the hon. Member that those who form the membership of these committees and serve on them are pretty astute. I am convinced that they know what they are about when they investigate these cases.
This first part of the plan was brought into operation on 4th January, 1960. On the second part—the withdrawal of local services north of Aylesbury—no announcement has yet been made but, as I told the hon. Member in answer to a Question on 22nd March, British Railways will be putting their proposals in due course to the consultative committees. Our general attitude to the whole of this sort of issue, as the House knows, is that we want to see a viable railway system. That does not necessarily mean that the whole of the present system can be made viable.
I will not quote the large number of statements that have been made by my right hon. Friends the Prime Minister and the Minister of Transport or what was stated in the White Paper on the reorganisation of the railways on the necessity for the Government to look at the whole matter in the light of modern conditions and the need for the purposeful slimming of the system.
It is, in our view, for the British Transport Commission to work out and to put forward specific proposals. They are losing £100 million a year at the moment and that amount is being borne

by the taxpayers. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer might have found his task somewhat easier last week if he did not have to bear this £100 million a year loss by the Commission. It works out at 4d. on the Income Tax. That deficit must be reduced, and it is for the transport users consultative committees to investigate methods of reducing the deficit.
In the context of the reorganisation of the Commission's affairs, we are examining the extent to which the existing machinery, including the transport users consultative committees, remains appropriate for the execution of the policy of restoring economic health to the railways.
It is no part of my duty to defend the Commission or to defend the transport users consultative committees, nor is it the Ministry's duty to do so, because my right hon. Friend has no direct responsibility in this case. My job is to give what information I can. Concerning the allegations made by the hon. Member for Hillsborough that there has been a deliberate effort on the part of the Commission to drive traffic off the line, thus making the picture look even more black, I hope, in the light of the explanation I have given to the House as to the way in which the Commission envisages this proposition, he will reconsider the objections he has put forward.
I cannot see how anyone could have an objection of that kind—of traffic being deliberately driven off the railways—because the railways have an obligation to pay their way, and if there is a prospect of their services paying their way, they would wish to extend and develop traffic.
There is often reported, particularly in the local Press, correspondence suggesting that there is a conflict between the managers of the London Midland Region and the former managers of the old Great Central Railway, and that a long deferred act of vengeance is in progress.

Mr. Darling: I did not say that.

Mr. Hay: I know the hon. Gentleman did not say that, but it is stated in correspondence, particularly in the local Press. I cannot believe that suggestion to be true, because both regions are part of the Commission's undertaking and, of course, the proposals for rationalisation of these lines are those of the Commission itself.
So far as the most important of the charges made by the hon. Member for Hillsborough is concerned—that the figures have been rigged in some way—this is a very serious matter, and I am not persuaded by what the hon. Gentleman said. I do not agree that some form of public inquiry would be the right course to adopt. If the hon. Gentleman will let me have chapter and verse of his allegation and will give the evidence he has quoted tonight, I can assure him that I will ask Sir Brian Robertson, the Chairman of the British Transport Commission, to have a meeting with me about it. If the hon. Gentleman will give me

all the facts, I will ask Sir Brian to consider this matter in the light of that information and the report of the debate in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Mr. Darling: I thank the Parliamentary Secretary for his offer—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman did not say the magic words, "Before the Joint Parliamentary Secretary sits down…".

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at six minutes to Twelve o'clock.